W. M. L. Jay

“ Bergan studied it attentively. "It is as fresh as a rose," said he, "and as sweet."
"The analogy, if there be any, goes deeper than that," rejoined Astra, bitterly. "A rose is born out of darkness and dampness and decay, and this is the offspring of pain and discouragement, and all that makes the hand weak and the heart sick."
"And that is probably the secret of its perfection," remarked Bergan, meditatively. "The loveliest graces of character—such as charity that thinketh no evil, and hope that lives by faith, not by sight—are the legitimate children of suffering. ”

“ What could she do, in her mortal terror and bewilderment, but follow it?
"Rosa," she said, suddenly, "I am going to the Hall. I must see Bergan, and hear what he has to say; then I can decide what it is right to do."
"And so I would," rejoined Rosa, approvingly. "Just let me slip this dark wrapper on you, and wind this scarf round your head, and well over your face,—so;—why, your own father wouldn't know you, if he were to meet you! Now, we'll be off."
Carice hesitated. "No, Rosa, that will never do; our absence would be quickly discovered. You must stay and keep the door." ”

“ Still, there was no sign of immediate loosing of the silver life-cord; on the whole, he thought that she bore her heavy burden of years wonderfully well, and the thought came naturally to his lips.
"It may seem so," replied the old woman, with a slow shake of her head, "but I feel a greater change than you can see, Master Bergan. Till now, I never knew anything about the chill or the heaviness of age; it has come upon me all at once. I do not think, any more than you do, that the end itself is close at hand; but the beginning of the end is certainly here. ”

“ The house won Bergan's liking, at a glance. It stood on a corner; it was large and airy; double piazzas surrounded it on three sides; over it a hale old live-oak and half-a-dozen gray, decrepit china-trees flung their pleasant shade. In the rear, was a tempting thicket of a garden, which Art had first planted, and then handed over to Nature, to be taken care of at her leisure,—the result being an altogether admirable and Eden-like wilderness of boughs and vines, and, in their season, flowers and fruits, such as can be seen nowhere but at the South. ”

“ Bergan could scarcely believe that it was Astra who spoke. Hitherto, she had been the moral sunshine of the house, felt even where it did not directly fall. Her spirit, in its potency of cheer, resembled the sunbeam which, though it kindle but one little spot on the floor into actual brightness, diffuses its light and cheerfulness throughout a whole room. As every article of furniture, every picture, every face, in the room, is the brighter for the sunbeam, so every inmate of Mrs. Lyte's rambling old dwelling had been the happier for Astra's presence and influence. ”

“ Yet it seemed to Bergan that some change had come over that face since he beheld it last—a certain suggestion of weariness under its languor, of dissatisfaction under its chill pride—which he accepted as a good augury for the task that he had in hand.
Miss Thane seemed to divine, at once, that his visit had some object other than the pleasure of seeing either herself or her pictures. After a few quiet words of greeting, she rested one hand upon her easel, and stood waiting, calm, proud, and exceeding beautiful, to be informed of its nature. ”

“ When my mind takes a leap into the future, it is not so much fees that I think of, as wrongs to be redressed, and rights to be protected, and influence to be gained and exercised,—yes, and fame and independence to be won."
"All very good things," returned Doctor Remy, smiling; "and all very dependent on those same fees, of which you think so little. Without money, you will not do much for right, nor against wrong; neither can you be independent, or famous, or influential."
"I do not know about that," rejoined Bergan, smiling. ”

“ Doctor Remy shrugged his shoulders with a frank cynicism. "Perhaps so," said he. "Yet I make bold to confess that my own practice is to look kindness a little more closely in the face than its opposite. The latter generally wears its reasons openly on its forehead; but for the complicated motives at the bottom of the former, one needs to look long and deep."
"Do they pay for the trouble?" asked Bergan, smiling.
"Not unless you love knowledge for its own sake. As society is constituted, you cannot well act upon it. To apparent kindness, one has to return apparent gratitude." ”

“ Years after, when Buonarotti had become Michael Angelo, and filled the world with his fame, Domenico sent for him to come to his death-chamber. 'What did the picture need?' he asked, faintly. 'Only speech,' replied Michael Angelo. The old master smiled,—and died."
"It is a touching story," said Bergan. "And it is almost an allegory, too. For 'only speech' is so often the great need of life! All our deepest feeling and best thought are inarticulate. ”

“ It loses none of its adaptability by use. In that tub is the original clay of everything that you see in my studio,—all the busts, statues, and reliefs, that I have ever done, or tried to do,—all my successes, and all my failures;—every one of them has gone into that tub, even as it came out of it."
"Creation and death!" exclaimed Bergan. "'Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return.' It is a world in miniature!"
"And does it not also show that there is nothing new under the sun?" said Astra. ”

“ Bergan was silent for a moment. He felt the sophistry, but could not, on the instant, detect wherein it lay. He allowed himself to be diverted from the main question by a side issue.
"You say that you save life," said he, "but do you feel that it is really you? Are you never conscious of a power above you, without whose help your efforts would avail nothing?"
"Granted, for the sake of argument," replied Doctor Remy, composedly. "Then you may believe that it is not your efforts which gain a cause, but the 'power above,' of which you speak." ”

“ A passer-by of delicate instincts would have seen at once that the long lease of silence and emptiness had expired. And in truth, it would have been strange if a dwelling, so old—so long familiar with human affairs and interests, the very timbers of which must have been oozy with the exhalations of a long succession of joys and sorrows—had not shown itself ready to sympathize with every passing phase of life, and especially to welcome back to its empty old bosom a fresh, young, beating heart.
That it did so, Bergan felt intuitively. ”

“ Major Bergan set down the glass that was on its way to his lips, and looked wonderingly at his guest.
"Why?" he asked.
"Because a man of your age, with your habits, breaks down soon, when once he begins."
"My habits!" growled the Major, drawing his eyebrows into a heavy frown, "what do you mean, you insolent scamp?"
"I mean," replied Doctor Remy, composedly, "habits at once active, careless, and self-indulgent; such as riding or walking in the heat of the day, spending hours in the rice fields, rising early and sitting up late, eating ad libitum, and drinking ad infinitum." ”

“ A day or two went by, and Carice was down-stairs again, white; still, patient; filling her old place, and doing her old tasks, with a sad composure that was more affecting than any abandonment of sorrow. Her woe seemed to take the form of torpor, rather than of anguish. It was that chill and heavy misery, that dismal realization of the actual presence and power of evil in the world, which never comes to us except through the sin of some cherished, trusted friend; standing hitherto as the representative of all that is good and true, the earthly type of the Divine perfection. ”

“ Wondrous sympathy of Nature with the bliss of two spirits made one,—the tender joy that keeps, throughout the musty years, the freshness and fragrance of its Eden birth! Yet, had the day still held its gloom, it would have been bright in Carice's eyes, and bright in Bergan's! Wherever Love is newly born, it creates a sunshine of the heart, which overflows upon the outward world, and fills it with celestial radiance. ”

“ Grief must be content to exercise over her limited, not absolute dominion.
Bergan withdrew to a little distance, and waited silently, looking out over the shadowy valley to the fair, flowing outline of the moon-silvered hills. Those womanly tears, he was certain, would afford most safe and seasonable relief to whatever pain and excitement, whatever distressful memories or dismal forebodings, had resulted from the evening's events. For himself, comparative stranger as he was, he had no right to give Miss Thane more than the silent sympathy of a heart itself not unacquainted with sorrow. ”

“ Lyte, from her work-table, frequently threw a passing remark into the conversation that came so freely to her ears; while Cathie continually flashed in and out like a fire-fly or a humming bird. But the worsted roses would scarcely have constituted a subject of mutual interest for the young man and woman, as did the clay figures; nor would the talks over them have run so naturally, and almost inevitably, upon the same elevated and impersonal plane of thought. Setting the worker entirely aside, Bergan could not fail to be deeply interested in the work. ”

“ To every one but Doctor Remy, Carice was gentleness itself. She was happiness, too, in a touchingly quiet, dreamy, illogical form. She was content to spend hours at the window, watching for the first glimpse of Bergan, with a smile on her lips, and her eyes bright with eager expectation; and though she sometimes sighed, when the day ended, and he did not come, she was ready to begin the same hopeful watch on the morrow, and never seemed to know how long it had lasted. As she grew stronger, she resumed, in some measure, her old pursuits;—she busied herself with light household tasks ”

“ But is this apparent death anything more than a partial decay, analogous to that by which thousands of perennial plants seem annually to perish from the face of the earth, under the frosts of autumn, but the roots of which, nevertheless, carefully preserve their life-principle within, ready to respond with swift springing verdure to the tender kisses and tears of the springtime sun and rain? Is not all death only a sleep?
Bergan had striven conscientiously to destroy his love for Carice, as a thing which, however innocent in its birth, had grown to be a sin. ”

“ The Major raised his eyebrows, and leaning forward, fixed his eyes on Doctor Remy, as if he had found a new and interesting subject of study.
"Do you mean to say," he asked, gravely, "that you would rather have Carice without Bergan Hall than with it?"
"Decidedly," replied Doctor Remy. "I prefer an equal match to an unequal one. I prefer to be credited with honorable motives, rather than mercenary ones. I don't want to be a pensioner on my wife's bounty. It is doubtful if I could ever make up my mind to address the heiress of Bergan Hall. ”

“ Bergan tore open the letter, and with an apologetic bow to the company, began eagerly to read it. Doctor Trubie seated himself by the table, picked up the rejected envelope, and gave it a critical examination.
"That's what I call a good hand," said he, "a round, clear, energetic hand, that neither tries your eyesight, nor rouses your distrust. There is no crookedness nor meanness in it; yet there is plenty of character; one can see, at a glance, that the writer is bold and sagacious as well as profound, a man of action as well as a man of science." ”

“ Out of this bitter knowledge Miss Thane finally spoke, apparently recurring in thought to their previous talk on the piazza;—
"Mr. Arling, how is one to love God, if one does not?"
It was perhaps the most difficult of all questions to answer. How are the blind eyes to be opened, and the deaf ears unstopped? How is the frozen heart to be softened, and the slumbering affection to be wakened into leaf and bloom? How is the Father to be made acceptable to the children that are insensible of His goodness, and will none of His reproof? ”

“ To this room, Bergan was easily guided by his groans and cries.
Never before had he seen a man in the terrible grasp of delirium tremens; and now, after a brief look, he was glad to turn away his eyes.
Major Bergan was on the bed, but he was only held there by the main strength of two stout negroes. A frightful spasm contorted his face and twisted his limbs. Great drops of perspiration stood on his brow; and from his mouth flowed a mingled stream of oaths, curses, shrieks of horror, threats of defiance, and groans of agony. His bodily anguish was only less than his mental torture. ”

“ All family mansions, however fair and proud, are surely destined to fall into stranger hands, or to be given over to the Vandal occupation of decay. All families, of however lofty position, are certain to sojourn, at times, in the valley of humiliation, if they do not lose themselves in the deeper valley of extinction. Would it not have been better, then, to have foregone somewhat of the frail and faithless magnificence of Bergan Hall, and linked the dear family name and memory more closely with the indestructible institution which belongs to the ages? ”

“ A Bergan without it—that is, a male, of course a woman counts for nothing—would be no Bergan at all."
"You say true, Master Harry," rejoined Rue, composedly; "it's always run in the blood, and heated it more than was good for it, many a time. Yet, now and then, there has been a Bergan who has learned how to keep it under, and been all the better for doing it. You surely must recollect what a mild, kind gentleman your father was, young as you were when he died; and I've heard say that there never was a truer Bergan, or one more respected all the country through." ”

“ Bergan, gently, "that it was for Carice's sake. We were thinking only of her."
"And so we did evil that good might come," returned his wife, somewhat ruefully. "But evil follows the universal law, and brings forth after its kind."
"What do you mean?" asked Mr. Bergan, looking both surprised and puzzled.
Mrs. Bergan smiled at him half-pityingly, half-sarcastically. "Oh, ye men!" she exclaimed, "if ye are wise as serpents, in matters of the intellect, ye are blind as bats, in matters of the heart." ”