Martin Farquhar Tupper

“ To those who love me, Emmy, I am frank and free; but with those who love us not, there is a wisdom and a justice in concealment. They do not deserve confidence, who will not extend to us their sympathy. None but yourself must know whither I am bound; and, after some little search for curiosity's sake, when a week is past and gone, no soul will care for me of those at home. With you, I will manage to communicate by post, directing my letters to Mrs. Sainsbury, at Oxton: I will prepare her for it. She knows my love for you, and how they try to thwart us ”

“ General Tracy gave a long-drawn sigh: and tears—tears of true affection—stood in those most fish-like eyes, as he mournfully said, "Bless him, bless dear Charles, almost as much as you, my own sweet Emmy. Heaven send it be true—for Heaven can work miracles. But without a miracle, Emily, in sober sadness I declare it, you must forget—your brother Charles, my daughter!" ”

“ Then, at arm's length, was the hunting-whip applied, full-swing; up the terrace, and down the parade, and through High-street, and Smith-street, and Oxton-road, and aristocratical Pacton-square, and the well-thronged plebeian market-place; lash, lash, lash, in furious and fast succession on the writhing roaring culprit; to the universal excoriation of Mr. Julian Tracy, and the amazement of an admiring and soon-collected crowd—the rank, beauty, and fashion—of Burleigh Singleton. ”

“ Now, Charles—now speedily to business; happy business that, if I may trust the lover's flushing cheek, and Emily's radiant eyes; but a mournful one too, and a fearful, if I turn my glance to that poor old man, wounded in body and stricken in mind—who waits to hear, in more despondency than hope, what he knows to be the bitter truth—the truth that must be told, to the misery of those dear children. ”

“ It is well, children, it is well, that ye should thus carry your wounded hearts for balm to the altar of God; it is well that ye should bow in meekness to His will, in readiness to His wisdom. Ye are learning the lesson speedily, as docile children should; and be assured of high reward from the Teacher who hath set it you. Poor Charles! white and wan, thy cheek is grown transparent with anxiety, and thy blue eye dim with hope deferred: poor Emmy, sick and weak, thou weariest Heaven with thy prayers, and waterest thy couch with thy tears. ”

“ Beauteous girl! how often have I watched thee with straining eyes and aching heart, as thou wentest on thy summer's walk so oftentimes to Oxton, there to exercise thy bountiful benevolence in comforting the sick, gladdening the wretched, and lingering, with love's own look, in Charles's village school; how often have I prayed, that guardian angels might be about thy path as about thy bed! For the prowling tiger was on thy track, poor innocent one, and many, many times nothing but one of God's seeming accidents hath saved thee. ”

“ My trouble is deeper than any thing so slight as the common satiations of ennui: for I have heard in these circles in which your—my—the general, I mean, chiefly mixed, so much of that ill-rumour that it cannot all be false: they knew it all, and were certain of it all, too well, Emily, dear. And I have been pestering Nurse Mackie night and day; but the old woman is so afraid of being left behind any where, or thrown overboard, or dropped, upon some desert rock, that she is quite cross, and won't say a single word in answer, even when I tell her all these terrible tales. ”

“ No, Emily; I am a man now, and take my own advice. If a parent forbade me, indeed, and reasonably, it would be fit to acquiesce; but knowing, as I have sad cause to know, that none but you, my love, will be sorry for my absence, as for your sake alone that absence is designed, I need take counsel only of us who are here present—your own sweet eyes, myself, and God who seeth us."
"True—most true, dear Charles; I knew that you judged rightly."
"Moreover, Emmy, secresy is needful for the due fulfilment of my purpose." (Charles little thought how congenial to his nature was that same secresy.) ”

“ It is gentleness and purity, no less than sensibility and passion, that look forth in such strange power from those windows of the mind: it is not the mere beautiful machine, fair form, and pleasing colours, but the heaven-born light of tenderness and truth, streaming through the lens, that takes the fond heart captive. Charles, for one, could not help looking long and keenly into Emily Warren's eyes ”

“ Emily's earliest recollections were of great barbaric pomp; huge elephants richly caparisoned, mighty fans of peacock's tails, lines of matchlock men, tribes of jewelled servants, a gilded palace, with its gardens and fountains: plenty of rare gems to play with, and a splendid queenly woman, whom she called by the Hindoo name for mother. The general, too, was there among her first associations, as the gallant Captain Tracy, with his company of native troops. ”

“ Then an era happened in her life; a tearful leave-taking with that proud princess, who scarcely would part with her for sorrow; but the captain swore it should be so: and an old Scotch-woman, her nurse, she could remember, who told her as a child, but whether religiously or not she could not tell, "Darling, come to me when you wish to know who made you;" and then Mrs. Mackie went and spoke to the princess, and soothed her, that she let the child depart peacefully. Most of her gorgeous jewellery dated from that earliest time of inexplicable oriental splendour. ”

“ Charles all the dearer for a Julian. Intensely did she love him, as only tropic blood can love; intently did she gaze on him, when any while he could not see her face, as only those dark eyes could gaze: and her mind, all too ignorant but greedy of instruction, no less than her heart, rich in sympathies and covetous of love, went forth, and fed deliciously on the intellectual brow, and delicate flushing cheek of her noble-minded Charles. Not all in a day, nor a week, nor a month, did their loves thus ripen together. Emily was a simple child of nature, who had every thing to learn ”

“ Julian was her favourite, and should have the girl if she could manage it; but if Emily Warren would not hear of such a husband, why Charles Tracy may far better get her money than any body else.
That she possessed great wealth was evident: such jewellery, such Trinchinopoli chains, such a blaze of diamonds en suite, such a multitude of armlets, and circlets, and ear-rings, and other oriental finery, had never shone on Devonshire before: at the Eyemouth ball, men worshipped her, radiant in beauty, and gorgeously apparelled. ”

“ Emily was taken very ill, and had a long fit of sickness. Day and night—night and day, did her poor wasting anxious father watch by her bed-side, gentle as the gentlest nurse—tender as the tenderest of mothers. And, indeed, the Lord of Life and Wisdom was gracious to them both; raising up the poor weak child again; and teaching that old man, through this daughter of his shame and sin in youth, that religion is a cure for all things. ”

“ A graceful shape is, luckily, almost the common prerogative of female youthfulness; a dimpled smile, a cheerful, winning manner, regular features, and a mass of luxuriant brown hair—these all heroines have—and so has our's.
But no heroine ever had yet Emily Warren's eyes; not identically only, which few can well deny; but similarly also, which the many must be good enough to grant: and very few heroes, indeed, ever saw their equal; though, if any hereabouts object, I will not be so cruel or unreasonable as to hope they will admit it. ”

“ Not but that it has its varieties of scene, and more or less of circumstances too: there are, on one flank, the breezy Heights, with flag-staff and panorama; on the other, broad and level water-meadows, skirted by the dark-flowing Mullet, running to the sea between its tortuous banks: for neighbourhood, Pacton Park is one great attraction—the pretty market-town of Eyemouth another—the everlasting, never-tiring sea a third; and, at high-summer, when the Devonshire lanes are not knee-deep in mire, the nevertheless immeasurably filthy, though picturesque, mud-built village of Oxton. ”

“ Oh, the rapture of that instant! it can but happen once within a life. Ye that have loved, remember such a meeting; and ye that never loved, conceive it if you can; for my pen hath little skill to paint so bright a pleasure. It is to be all heart, all pulse, all sympathy, all spirit—but the warm soft kiss, that rarified bloom of the Material.
How the sick old nurse got out, cased in many blankets; how she was bundled up stairs, and deposited safely on a sofa, no poet is alive to sing: to those who would record the payment of postillions, let me leave so sweet a theme. ”

“ And she cried a great deal, and longed to come to England; but the general would not hear of it; so he pensioned her off, and left her at Madras, giving somebody strict orders not to let her follow him.
Nevertheless, just as they were getting into the boat to cross the surf, the affectionate old soul ran out upon the strand, and called to her "Amy Stuart! Amy Stuart!" to the general's great amazement as clearly as her own; and she held up a packet in her hand as they were pushing off, and shouted after her, "Child—child! if you would have your rights, remember Jeanie Mackie!" ”

“ That Charles had heard some meddlesome report, which (if true) was to be an insuperable barrier to their future union, struck me at a glimpse. But I had not the heart to hint it to her; and only encouraged hope—hope, in God's help, through the means of Mrs. Mackie and her papers.
As for the poor girl herself, she asked me, in much humility, and with many sobs, if I did not fear that her Hindoo mystery was this:—she was the vilest of the vile, a Pariah, an outcast, whose very presence is contamination!
Beautiful, loving, heavenly-hearted creature! ”

“ Julian was strong indeed, and a coal-heaver in build, but conscience had unnerved him; and the coarse noisy bully always is a coward: therefore, it was a pleasant thing to see how easy came the captain's work to him—he had nothing to do but to lash, lash, lash, double-thonged, like a slave-driver: and, except that he made the caitiff move along, to be a spectacle to man and woman, up and down the town, he might as well, for any difficulty in the deed, have been employed in scarifying a gate-post. ”

“ Julian held somewhat aloof, for the scene was too depressing for his taste: so he affected to read a prayer-book, wrong way up, with his tongue in his cheek: Charles, deeply solemnized at the near approach of death, knelt at the poor invalid's bedside; and Emily stood by, leaning over her, suffused in tears. At the further corners of the bed, might be seen an old servant or two; and Mrs. Green's butler and coachman, each a forty years' fixture, presented their gray heads at the bottom of the room, and really looked exceedingly concerned. ”