Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

“ Johnston, I have this to say. It is written,—'Whoso hateth his brother is a murderer,' and in that sense, I am one,—for I did hate him at the time; but I never meant to kill him—and the moment afterwards I would have given my life for his. If now, my death could restore him to you, alive again, how willingly I would die.”
“Die, and face your Maker? an unpardoned man-slayer, a lost soul?”
“Whether I live or die,” said I, humbly, “I trust my soul is not lost. I have been very guilty; but I believe in One who brought to every sinner on earth the gospel of repentance and remission of sins.” ”

“ Besides, she is not the only one wronged. Sometimes, even sitting by my sister's bedside, I see the vision of that pretty young creature—she was so pretty and innocent when she first came to live at Rockmount,—with her boy in her arms; and my heart feels like to burst with indignation and shame, and a kind of shuddering horror at the wickedness of the world—yet with a strange feeling of unutterable pity lying at the depth of all.
Max, tell me what you think—you who are so much the wiser of us two; but I think that even if she wished it still, my sister ought not to marry Francis Charteris. ”

“ Max, if ever I am yours, altogether in your power, I wonder, will you ever give me those sort of bitter, cruel words? Words which people, living under the same roof, think nothing of using—mean nothing by them—yet they cut sharp, like swords. The flesh closes up after them—but oh, they bleed—they bleed! Dear Max, reprove me as you will, however much, but let it be in love, not in anger or sarcasm. Sometimes people drop carelessly, by quiet firesides, and with a good-night kiss following, as papa gave to me, words which leave a scar for years. ”

“ Max, I have been weak, wicked of late; afraid of absence, which tries me sore, because I am not strong, and cannot stand up by myself as I used to do; afraid of death, which might tear you from me, or me from you, leaving the other to go mourning upon earth for ever. Now I feel that absence is nothing—death itself nothing, compared to one loss—that which has befallen my sister, Penelope. ”

“ I asked papa if he did not remember Lydia?
She came to us, Max, when she was only fourteen, though, being well-grown and hand some, she looked older;—a pleasant, willing, affectionate creature, only she had “no head,” or it was half-turned by the admiration her beauty gained, not merely among her own class, but all our visitors. I remember Francis saying once—oh, how angry Penelope was about it—that Lydia was so naturally elegant she could be made a lady of in no time, if a man liked to take her, educate and marry her. Would he had done it! spite of all broken vows to Penelope. ”

“ I ended my letter by the-earnest advice, that he should go and settle in Canada, and go at once; but that he must remember he had to take with him one trifling incumbrance—me.
When the words were written, the deed done, I was a little startled at myself. It looked so exceedingly like my making him an offer of marriage! But then—good-bye, foolish doubt! good-bye contemptible, shame! Those few tears that burnt my cheeks after the letter was gone, were the only tears of the sort that I ever shed—that Max will ever suffer me to shed. Max loves me! ”

“ This morning, when the little postman went whistling past Rockmount gate, I turned almost sick with fear.
Understand me—not with one sort of fear. Faithlessness or forgetfulness are—Well, with, you they are—simply impossible! But you are my Max; anything happening to you happens to me; nothing can hurt you without hurting me. Do you feel this as I do? if so, surely, under any circumstances, you would write.
Forgive! I meant not to blame you; we never ought to blame what we cannot understand. Besides, all this suspense may end to-morrow. Max does not intend to wound me; Max loves me. ”

“ Sleep came; but it ended in dreadful dreams, out of which I awoke, screaming, to see Penelope standing by my bedside, with my breakfast.
Now, I had already laid my plans—to tell my father all. For he must be told. No other alternative presented itself to me as possible—nor, I knew, would it to Max. When two people are thoroughly one, each guesses instinctively the other's mind; in most things always in all great things, for one faith and love includes also one sense of right. I was as sure as I was of my existence that Max meant my father to be told. ”

“ There is no sting even in my saddest' thought concerning you. I trust you, I feel certain that whatever you do, you will do right; that all you have to endure will be borne nobly and bravely. Thus, I may grieve over your griefs, but never over you. My love of you, like my faith in you, is above all grieving. Forgive this long digression; to-day is Sunday, the best day in all the week, and my day for thinking most of you.
To return. Penelope and I were both merry, as we started by the very earliest train, in the soft May morning; we had so much business to get through. ”

“ After a single day spent at Treherne Court, Augustus went with us one sunshiny morning on board the American steamer, which lay so peacefully in the middle of the Mersey—just as if she were to lie there for ever, instead of sailing, and we with her—in one little half hour. Sailing far away, far away to a home we knew not, leaving the old familiar faces and the old familiar land.
It seemed doubly precious now, and beautiful; even the sandy flats, that Max had so often told me about, along the Mersey shore. ”

“ Oh, Max, for the first minute or so, I felt as if the whole world were crumbling from under my feet—as I could trust nobody, believe in nobody—until I remembered you. My dear Max, my own dear Max! Ah, wretched Penelope!
I took her hand as she stood, but she twisted it out of mine again. I listened mechanically to Francis, as he again began rapidly and eagerly to exculpate himself to my father.
“She may tell you all, if she likes. I have done no worse than hundreds do in my position, and under my unfortunate circumstances, and the world forgives them, and women too. ”

“ In quiet evenings such as this, when, after a rainy day, it has just cleared up in time for the sun to go down, and he is going down peacefully in amber glory, with the trees standing up so purple and still, and the moorlands lying bright, and the hills distinct even to their very last faint rim—in such evenings as this, Max, when I want you and cannot find you, but have to learn to sit still by myself, as now, I learn to think also of the meeting which has no farewell, of the rest that comes to all in time, of the eternal home. ”

“ Francis replied nothing, but he held his little son closer to his breast. Who knows but that the pretty boy may be heaven's messenger to save the father's soul?
You see, Max, I still like, in my old moralizing habit, to “justify the ways of God to men,” to try and perceive the use of pain, the reason of punishment; and to feel, not only by faith, but experience, that, dark as are the ways of Infinite Mercy, they are all safe ways. “All things work together for good to them that love Him.” ”

“ Life at Rockmount, as I said, is dull. I rise sometimes, go through the day, and go to bed at night, wondering what I have been doing during all these hours. And I do not always sleep soundly, though so tired. Perhaps it is partly the idea of Penelope's going away so soon; far away, across the sea, with no one to love her and take care of her, save Francis.
Understand, this is not with any pitying of my sister for what is a natural and even a happy lot, which no woman need complain of; but simply because Francis is Francis—accustomed to think only of himself, and for himself. ”

“ I, a poor clerk, with neither health, nor income, nor prospects—”
He stopped, and no wonder, before the rebuke of my sister's eyes.
“Francis, you know you are not speaking as you think. You know I have given you my true reason, and my only one. If we were engaged still, in outward form, I should say exactly the same, for a broken promise is less wicked than a deceitful vow. One should not marry—one ought not—when one has ceased to love.” ”

“ O Harry, my brother, whom I never knew—no more than any stranger in the street, and the faint memory of whom was mixed with an indefinite something of wickedness, anguish, and disgrace to us all, if I felt not as I ought, then or afterwards, forgive me. If, though your sister, I thought less of you dead than of my living Max—my poor, poor Max, who had borne this awful burthen for twenty years—Harry, forgive me! ”

“ This great prison is, you know, a model of its kind, on the solitary, sanitary, and moral improvement system; excellent, no doubt, compared with that which preceded it. The prisoners are numerous,-and as soon as many of them get out they take the greatest pains to get in again; such are the comforts of gaol life contrasted with that outside. Yet they seem to me often like a herd of brute beasts, fed and stalled by rule in the manner best to preserve their health, and keep them from injuring their neighbours; their bodies well looked after, but their souls—they might scarcely have any! ”

“ What best becomes me is humility, and gratitude to God and man. Had I known in my wretched youth, when, absorbed in terror of human justice, I forgot justice divine, had I but known there were so many merciful hearts in this world!
After Colin Granton left me last night, I slept quietly, for I felt quiet and at rest. O the peace of an unburdened conscience, the freedom of a soul at ease—which, the whole truth being told, has no longer anything to dread, and is prepared for everything!
I rose calm and refreshed, and could see through my cell-window that it was a lovely spring morning. ”

“ With a love that, I think, those only feel who have suffered, and suffered together: a love that, though it may have known a few pains, has never, thank God, known a single doubt. And so you did not feel so very far away.
Then I walked on as fast as I could, to meet the pony-carriage, which I saw crawling along the road round the turn—past the very cottage. My heart beat so! But Penelope drove quietly on, looking straight before her. She would have driven by in a minute; when, right across the road, in front of the pony, after a dog or something, I saw run a child. ”

“ Ah me! papa said truly I was no longer a child. I feel hardly even a girl, but quite an old woman—familiar with all sorts of sad and wicked things, as if the freshness and innocence had gone out of life, and were nowhere to be found. Except when I turn to-you, and lean my poor sick heart against you—as I do now. Max, comfort me! ”

“ The rest of the world are free to be their own judges in the matter; but God and my conscience are mine.
I went downstairs steadfastly, with my mind all clear. Even to the last minute, with my hand on the parlor-door, my heart—where all throbs of happy love seemed to have been long, long forgotten—my still heart prayed.
Max was standing by the fire—he turned round. He, and the whole sunshiny room swam before my eyes for an instant,—then I called up my strength and touched him. He was trembling all over.
“Max, sit down.” He sat down. ”