Beata

“ Beata.
(Letting her arms sink down helplessly.) I can't.
Richard.
Wait, dear. (He loosens her veil.) How white you are! Come to the fire. (He leads her to the fireplace.) There! is that right?
Beata.
Everything is right as long as you're alive!
Richard.
Why, Beata, what put such an idea into your head?
Beata.
Hasn't it been in yours ever since yesterday?
Richard.
There will be no duel, I assure you.
Beata.
I have just read your speech. It was your goodbye to the world. Oh, don't laugh--don't deny it. I've felt death hanging over us ever since. ”

“ Suddenly they heard a distant rush through the wood on each side of them, like the tramp of hoofs, and the startled creatures of the wood scampered through the brushwood, or whirled across their path in hasty flight.
"God help us! it is the mounted soldiers!" exclaimed Beata. "But collect yourself--your dress disguises you perfectly. Do not betray yourself." And she hastily snatched the bandage from his eyes and hid it in her bosom; then she pulled the hat low over his brow so that his eyes might not be seen under its broad brim. ”

“ Beata--whose womanly eye probably found again with ease the goddess and disposer of her joys, from whom she had without difficulty separated herself under the pretext of sickness by her furnished--would have dismantled and bowed herself even more, had it not been for my romancing colleague Oefel; who sufficiently annoyed her and infused into her cup of sorrow refreshing drops of anger, by coming constantly and, in the loveliest veiled and desolate eye of forsaken love, detecting and demanding a love that belonged to himself. ”

“ Oefel did his part well enough--Beata still better--and Gustavus the very worst of all. For the faces of the Prince and the Fainting Lady, like salt and nitric acid, almost transformed his heart into an icicle; there are many people before whom one is nerveless and incapable of having inspired feelings. Singular! only his, but not Beata's, were chilled by this north-wind sweeping over the stage. And yet after all it is not singular; for love throws the young man out of his own self into other personalities around him, but repels the maiden from others back into her own. ”

“ What pleased him about Beata (and in every maiden) was simply this, that he, as he thought, pleased her; of all the five hundred million women on the earth he would have loved every one if he had pleased them all; on the contrary not one of them, if not one of them liked him. He now related to Gustavus, through what window in the greenhouse of Beata's heart he had seen her love to him bloom out. Except a certain blockhead whom I knew in Leipsic, and a cat, who has nine lives, no man had more lives than this man ”

“ The Lady Beata hastily thrust him aside and opened the white robe at the throat, and Marcantonio started back; there were stripes of half-healed laceration on the tender flesh—some fresh, as if but just raised by the lash.
"Ay, my lord," Beata answered very low, to his quick, grieved question; "all that a daughter of the Church may do hath our lady added to her prayers for Venice. She hath been rigorous in fasting and in penance until her strength is gone; but the pain of it she feeleth not, because of the greater pain of her soul, which is lost in supplication that availeth naught." ”

“ MY DEAR TROLLOPE,—We have now read La Beata [my first novel] , and must tell you how charmed we have been with it. Nina herself is perfectly exquisite and individual, and her story is full of poetry and pathos. Also one feels a breath from the Val d'Arno rustling amid the pages, and a sense of Florentine life, such as one rarely gets out of books. ”

“ It's too bad to tantalize her with a thing she can't wear, and no properly brought up little girls wear such jewelry; even if they did, I should not let Beata do anything so silly and improper. No; it must be put away for her till she is eighteen, and 'comes out.' Poor child! I won't take it away for a week or two; it would be cruel; but go it must. Why couldn't Helga have sent her some books, or a doll, or anything sensible?"
But of all this Beata heard not a word, and her cup of bliss seemed as if it would run over. Such a locket! as grand as a grown-up young lady's, and for her very own! ”

“ Suddenly there comes Beata Maria, tears streaming down her white face.
“Dear sister ours,” spake St. Elias, “thou Beata Maria! What great misfortune hath befallen thee that thou shouldst shed tears down thy cheeks?”
Thereupon, amid her sobs, Beata Maria said: “O my dear brother, thou Thunderer Elias! How could I refrain from shedding tears, since I am just come from India—from India, that accursed country? In that degraded land there is utter lawlessness: the common people do not respect their superiors; children do not obey their parents ”

“ With that she knew, as Beata had known, that this was the reward of virginity, that each virgin could mother the Christ-child afresh. She knew that to those to whom the joy of making a living body with its corresponding soul is denied, creation is not stilled, that there need be no barrenness in a garden enclosed. ”

“ Rossetti hanging there on the same hooks with Rossetti's raiment. Rossetti made apology for the seeming confusion and said, "You see, if I did not find traces of her all over the house I should surely die."
A year after the death of his wife Rossetti painted the wonderful "Beata Beatrix," a portrait of Beatrice sitting in a balcony overlooking Florence. The beautiful eyes filled with ache, dream and expectation are closed as if in a transport of calm delight. An hourglass is at hand and a dove is just dropping a poppy, the flower of sleep and death, into her open hands. ”

“ The devil take Leonie! She can't hold her cursed meddling tongue; Richard ought to muzzle her. By the way, it's strange he hasn't shown himself to-day.
Beata.
I have had a note from him. He asked me to tell you that he is deep in his speech. He is coming as soon as he has a moment to spare.
Kellinghausen.
There you are again! Just when the man needs a clear head for the great work that's before him, he finds himself involved in this filthy-- Ah, well, I'll have the dogs by the throat yet! I'll have them howling for mercy!
Beata.
Do calm yourself, Michael. Look--your face is all on fire. ”

“ Rosmer.
[As if surprised..] You—in my bedroom! You have been listening, dear? But you are so emancipated. Ah, well! so our pure and beautiful friendship has been misinterpreted, bespattered! Just because you wear a morning wrapper, and have lived here alone for a year, people with coarse souls and ignoble eyes make unpleasant remarks! But what really did drive Beata mad? Why did she jump into the mill-race? I'm sure we did everything we could to spare her! I made it the business of my life to keep her in ignorance of all our interests—didn't I, now?
Rebecca. ”

“ I rather suspected,” said Agatha.
“I should think the best thing for Sister Mena would be to go to a good school, leave off her veil, in which she looks so pretty, and be treated like an ordinary girl,” said Lady Merrifield.
“That is just what Sister Beata intends,” said Miss Mohun. “She is to sink down into Miss Marian Jenkins, to wear a straw hat and blue frock, and go to school with the other girls, the pupils, while Sister Beata begins life as a probationer at Dearport.”
“Poor Sister Beata!”
“She says she has experienced that it is best to learn to obey before one begins to rule. ”

“ On Sunday, too, I find much more beautiful faces than on the six work days which disguise everything in smut.
The conversation must have been indifferent, I think, even at the forget-me-not. Beata, namely, found one lying in the grass, and ran up to it and--lo, it was made of silk: "Oh, it's a false one," said she. "Only a dead one," said Gustavus, "but a durable." Among persons of a certain refinement everything easily turns to allusion! Good nature is therefore indispensable to them, that they may infer no allusions but kindly ones. ”

“ But in the forenoon, she added smiling, you must not come; Beata absolutely refuses to be painted.
----The reader has not yet, in the whole book, been allowed to speak or write three words: I will now let him come up to the grating or into the parloir and will write down his questions. "What, then,"--he asks--"is in the Resident Lady's mind? Will she cut out of Gustavus a toothed cog-wheel, which she may put into some unknown machine or other?--Or is she constructing the hunter's screen and twisting the elastic net, to pounce upon and catch him? ”

“ Leonie.
What did I say? I congratulate you, Beata! (She goes out alone.)
Norbert.
What has she been saying to you?
Beata.
Oh, she was right--so right!
Norbert (alarmed) .
Aunt Beata!
Beata (with an effort) .
Norbert--my son--take me to Ellen. In a few minutes I shall be quite----
Norbert.
Come, come-- (Leads her gently out. Sounds of talk and laughter come from the inner room.)
Enter Kellinghausen.
Kellinghausen.
(Putting his head through the curtains.) Ha! No one there? Have our wives made way with each other? (To Richard, who has followed him.) They're not so deuced fond of one another. ”

“ No actual child that [177] might have been cried to the Beata consciousness, only natural longings apart from any one person, yet the anguish bit keenly, for with it went fear—the deadly fear lest barrenness should be deliberate sin against life. Powerless to help, Sophia saw the thought turn in the other's mind, and with that they both entered into the last phase of the vision. Here Sophia, who had not trained herself, like Beata, to prolonged sustaining of the will, flagged and began to fail. ”

“ Those dear Sisters! There is no nonsense about them. You will love them, Nag.”
“Well, it does not seem to me to be treating our own sister Magdalen fairly.”
“The M.A.!” said Vera, in a tone of wonder.
“No; not to be intimate with a person you do not introduce to her, because you do not think she would consider him as on equal terms.”
“Sister Beata quite approves,” added Paula, sincerely, not guessing how little Sister Beata knew of the situation, of which she only heard through the medium of her own representations to Sister Mena. ”

“ He had, namely, in the medical company of his father, often visited Beata, in her sicknesses, at Maussenbach; he had received at her hands that frank confidence which many maidens in their sick days always express, or in well ones, toward young men who appear to them at once virtuous and indifferent; the good Participle in dus, Amandus, assumed therefore after some reflection, that a letter which Beata had translated as a specimen, from Rousseau's Heloise, on fine paper--no maiden writes on coarse--and which had been written to the deceased Saint Preux, was addressed to the Participle himself. ”

“ Beata.
That is what I've come for. (To Richard.) My dear Völkerlingk, I want to speak to you.
Kellinghausen.
(To Richard, as he approaches.) Mind you obey orders, now! (Joins the others.)
Richard.
I am glad you are not too tired, Beata.
Beata.
I've been growing stronger every day since the elections. But you must take some notice of Leonie, Richard. She is saying things.
Richard.
Let her. It's her specialty.
Beata.
Every one knows that she never comes here, and her being here to-night is making people talk.
Baron Ludwig. ”

“ Beata.
By and by, at Rossitsch, I'll tell you. When we sit together in the big hall, over the fire, with the wind singing in the chimney. You'll like that, won't you, dear? We'll be so jolly together, you and I. And now, darling, go. (Passionately.) No, come back-- (kissing her) and now-- (smiling at her) go dear, go! (Ellen goes out.)
Enter Conrad.
Beata.
Has every one come?
Conrad.
All but Baron Richard.
Beata.
You may announce luncheon, then. (Conrad goes out. A moment later he throws open the doors, and Baron Ludwig, Prince Usingen, Baron Brachtmann, and Kellinghausen enter.) ”

“ I am so thankful to God and to Father Letheby."
"It is really good news, Beata," I replied. I sometimes called her Beata, for Bittra sounds horrid. I intend to compromise on her wedding morn by calling her Beatrix. "Really good news. It will add considerably to the happiness of one, whose only object in life appears to be to make every one around her happy. But there is no other news that may be supposed to interest in a far-off way the old pastor, who gave Beata her First Communion, and—?" ”

“ They were all dressed in their peasant best, and were laughing and joking, and telling Beata that they wished her many, strong children—this is quite a proper wish in Italy, and I really don’t know why it shouldn’t be anywhere; but people would think it queer, I suppose, if you said it at a wedding in Pennsylvania, or in New York—and before we started for the church, which was down in the valley below us, we all joined [Pg 212] hands and circled Beata and Pietro who stood in the center, holding hands and smiling at each other shyly. ”

“ Slightly, if at all, did Beata notice the approaches of the reigning actor or acting Regent. Oefel, however, saw it, and anticipated his victory over the exalted rival--who made his approaches to him in no very large snail-line, as was his custom with the Court ladies, who only in youth give away their virtue a la minutia; in old age, on the contrary, drive a larger business with it in grosso. ”

“ And our souls are still thrown by the million to the Moloch of social expediency. We are all expected to sacrifice our personal happiness to the welfare of the race! (She laughs excitedly.)
Kellinghausen (almost threateningly) .
Beata!
Baron Ludwig.
Countess, you are conjuring up a phantom.
Beata.
It may be a phantom, but it has us by the throat.-- (To Richard.) What are you thinking of, Völkerlingk? You are not going to refuse our celebrated game-pie?
Richard.
I beg your pardon. I wasn't thinking. (He helps himself to the dish.)
Beata. ”