Sibyl

“ The dark, bright face of Sibyl paled at the dread omen. Involuntarily her eyes sought Drummond's who also had been gazing at the sky.
"Heaven avert the omen!" she cried, with a shudder. "Oh, Willard, the unclouded moon grew dark even while I spoke."
"And now the cloud is past, and it sails on brighter than ever," he said, with a smile. "See, fairest Sibyl, all is calm and peaceful once more. My prediction will be verified, after all." ”

“ Into the golden wilderness of the Park they plunged presently, and then Lady Sibyl drew breath. She was now fairly embarked upon her enterprise, and the long day stretched invitingly before her. It was not yet noon, this whole alien world of which she had suddenly become a part was smiling and singing about her, the hoarse call of every passing motor was like a greeting and a challenge, and here was she, Sibyl Chevelton, roving at large in America, accompanied only by a smiling boy bribed to doubtful acquiescence by chestnuts and apples. ”

“ When the old Sibyl came forth Aurora was upon the ground, her forehead resting against the idol, and murmuring some wild words through a passion of tears.
“Repeat,” said the Sibyl, standing over her, and holding up the heavy iron lamp that flared lividly over the mutilated features of the marble and the wild face of the Gitanilla. “Say it again, thus with your face where it is. If there is a lie on your lips that stone will sear them as with a red hot iron.” ”

“ Sibyl's character--mind and heart and body and soul--had been formed by the strength and purity of her mountain environment; by her association with her parents, with Myra Willard, and with her parents' life-long friends; and by her mental comradeship with the greatest spirits that music and literature have given to the world. As her physical strength and beauty was the gift of her free mountain life, the beauty and strength of her pure spirit was the gift of those kindred spirits that are as mountains in the mental and spiritual life of the race. ”

“ Oh, Sibyl, in a moment of thoughtless passion he married me; but all the time he loved you best. I can see it all now. He loved you then—he loves you now, better than all the world."
"And you can forgive him for the irreparable wrong he has done you—a deserted home, a blighted life, and an early death? Christie, you are an angel!"
"No, no; only a frail sinner, with so much to be forgiven herself, that she can easily, joyfully forgive that. Sibyl, my hours are numbered. ”

“ The poor Sibyl, as she sits benumbed by her hearth of leaves, scourged by the flaying north-east winds, feels at her heart a cruel pang, for she feels herself all alone. But that very thought again brings her relief. With returning pride returns a vigour that warms her heart and lights up her soul. Intent, quick, and sharp, her sight becomes as piercing as those needles; and the world, the cruel world that caused her suffering, is to her transparent as glass. ”

“ Oh! I wronged him by ever doubting his truth. I could stake my hopes of heaven on his fidelity now," exclaimed Sibyl, with some of her old fierce impetuosity.
"Thank Heaven for that!" said Mrs. Brantwell, with a sigh of relief. "Oh! Sibyl, dearest, eradicate forever from your heart this fatal dream of jealousy; to doubt one we love is deepest misery."
"Oh! I know it; I know it," said Sibyl, with a shudder, as she recalled the stormy past.
And just then the tripping of light feet approaching the door was heard.
"It is the girls coming back to take you down stairs," said Mrs. Brantwell. ”

“ I only say I think there may be men here; if there are, your noise will only reveal where we are; if there are not, there is no occasion for your terror. Come, follow me; we must search the house."
"Oh, Miss Sibyl, I's afeard! 'Deed, de Lord knows I's afeard!" said poor Lem, in shivering tones.
"Pshaw! Do you think you will be any safer here? Come, give over your fears, and follow me," said Sibyl, as she turned toward the hall once more.
"Oh, Miss Sibyl, don't wenture! We'll be all 'sassinated if you do." ”

“ Sibyl, dearest, are you ill—fainting!"
Pale, trembling, and excited, the once fearless Sibyl Campbell clung to his arm, white with vague, sickening horror. Superstitious to an unusual degree, an awful presentiment had clutched her heart; and, for a moment she seemed dying in his arms.
"Sibyl! Sibyl! my dearest love!" he said, in alarm, "what is it?"
"Nothing—nothing," she answered, in a tremulous voice; "but, oh, Willard! do you believe the prediction?"
"Strange, wild girl that you are! has this idle talk frightened you so?" he said, smiling at her wild, dilated eyes. ”

“ Oh, I haven't the courage to go after my dreams, that's all!" wailed "Lady Imogen" suddenly.
Lady Sibyl sprang to the ground and caught "Lady Imogen's" hands, cold and trembling, in her own.
"Good-bye," she said, her eyes filling with swift tears. "But perhaps, if we just stay at home, the dreams will come to us!" ”

“ To her delight his face was one substantial wreath of smiles, not derisive nor abashed, as a boy's smiles are wont to be, but plainly sympathetic. As for the little old lady, she nodded as simply as if Lady Sibyl had announced herself to be upon an expedition to purchase late pippins.
"Aye," she said comprehendingly, "but they're hard to find—the dreams we used to have." ”

“ Maverick smiled appreciatively. "Today is the good old man's birthday," said he, "and it is called Saint Syrol's day, though few celebrate it. But it falls out that on this day the hearts of all true believers, whether they know about the saint or not, are wonderfully stirred. And they are seized with a desire to go out and find magic."
Lady Sibyl looked away in the dim silver of the woods at her right, and though she would have spoken she fell silent, with the wonder of it all. ”

“ Young, rich, and beautiful! Sibyl! Sibyl! what an enviable fate is yours!"
Sibyl's cheek flushed, and her eyes brightened, as she thought of Willard. For his sake she rejoiced over her new-found fortune. Often and bitterly had she secretly regretted, and her pride revolted at the idea of becoming the bride of one so far superior in wealth and fortune. But now she was his equal! there was triumph, joy, exultation in the thought. His aristocratic friends could not look down on her now—could not despise her for her poverty. Look down on her—a Campbell of the Isle! ”

“ She left them waving farewells.
"Oh," she thought, "the world is all alike. Mad or sane, office-boy or Saint Syrol's prophet, or Englishwoman at large in America—we are all looking for dreams to come true, and longing to run away to find them. Perhaps that is why they don't come to us."
The shadows were lengthening and growing indistinct, and the sun hung low and red above the poplars at the edge of the far field. For the first time, as she looked, Lady Sibyl felt alarm, for the lowering sun takes confidence with him, a hostage. Then the spirit of the day danced back to her face. ”

“ I am not, like you, bright Sibyl, naturally superstitious; but I confess, when the interpreter ushered me into the presence of this wizard, I felt a sort of chilly awe creeping over me. He was the most singular-looking being I ever beheld. His face was exactly like that of one who has been for some days dead—a sort of dark-greenish white, with pale-blue lips, and sharp, Asiatic features. His eyes, black and piercingly sharp, looked forth from two deep caverns of sockets, and seemed the only living feature in his ghastly face. ”

“ If I had been on intimate terms with Jeremiah, or if I had been the ancient king to whom the sibyl brought the mysterious books, would not my friend in the one case, and the messenger in the other, have appeared before me bearing the ordinary proportions and exhibiting the usual appearance of my own species? Does not Sacred History inform me that the prophet was a Man, and does not Profane History describe the sibyl as an Old Woman? Is old age never venerable and striking in real life?—But I am uttering heresies. ”

“ One advantage in being the daughter of a hundred earls is that one is natively able to meet them all, walking ghostly with their coffin shoes in their hands, and betray no great surprise. Perhaps, too, it was that the wine of the morning was running in Lady Sibyl's veins so that, as it always is with a happy few, nothing delightful seemed unreal. ”

“ Clouds hung low upon them, and the dim trees were thick and pall like, blacking the night below him.
The unfortunate Moorish king seemed near by. Never, perhaps, had history pressed so close upon a human heart. Lord Clare for a moment forgot his own position, the Sibyl, Aurora, everything in his intense realization of the past.
“In, in,” exclaimed the Sibyl. “I see a man creeping round yon corner of the Fonde; we have no time. If you fear, stay behind: the men of our people know how to avenge themselves in the day time as well as in the dark.” ”

“ Very beautiful was this reverence paid to the Sibyl amid all the idolatries of paganism and the corruptions of later Judaism. We may regard it as a relic of the early piety of the world. One who could pass over the interests and distractions of her own time, and fix her gaze upon the distant future, must have seemed far removed from the common order of mankind, who live exclusively in the present, and can imagine no other or higher state of things than they see around them. ”

“ For all I knew it could have opened on the Pit itself: but a shaft of light guided me stumbling into a stone-flagged kitchen, low and dim and smoky in fact as some lesser inferno.
By the hearth a woman turned from tending the kettle to overlook us steadily. She was alone, but my faith! she had no need to fear. Figure to yourself this massive sibyl with a face planned on a mason's square, deep-chiselled and brooding in the flush of firelight. She was like that. Yes, a sibyl in her cave, to whom Bibi-Ri entered gingerly as a cat.
"I am here, Mother Carron," he said. ”

“ I remember well the afternoon, warm, languid and still, when I took Sibyl to see the woman-author she had so long admired. The heat was so great that in our own grounds all the birds were silent, but when we approached Lily Cottage the first thing we heard was the piping of a thrush up somewhere among the roses,—a mellow liquid warble expressing ‘sweet content,’ and mingling with the subdued coo-cooings of the dove ‘reviewers’ who were commenting on whatever pleased or displeased them in the distance. ”

“ She was like one of the lesser angels when she asked for advice.
"I don't know," he confessed ruefully, "but if I were a woman, I'd find a way."
"You disappoint me," pouted Lady Sibyl; "women are always being decorated with generalizations instead of fed with suggestions. Why don't you tell me to go and put bubbles in my hair and dance in the south wood all night? You aren't practical."
Queenborough rose. "Pamela," he said, with mock severity, "who is this Lady Sibyl whom you are passing as your sister?—for anyone less like the accepted British maid I have never seen." ”

“ Sibyl started from her reverie, and blushed deeply at finding her thoughts thus interpreted. Stafford turned pale as he watched her glowing face; and the conviction came home to him, for the first time, that Sibyl Campbell's rare beauty was appreciated by other eyes than his.
"By the way, when was Drummond here?" asked Captain Campbell.
"Day before yesterday—wasn't it, Sibyl? He doesn't visit us very often—not half so often as so devoted a lover should. Oh, you needn't try to annihilate me with those flashing eyes of yours, my lady. I'm not a young gentleman, thank goodness! ”

“ There was no sign of disapproval on Lady Sibyl’s fair countenance,—her father was bending forward eagerly, apparently gloating over every detail,—Rimânez wore that inscrutable expression of his in which no feeling whatever could be discerned. The ‘woman with the past’ went on with her hysterical sham-heroics, and the mealy-mouthed fool of a hero declared her to be a ‘pure angel wronged,’ and the curtain fell amid loud applause. One energetic hiss came from the gallery, affecting the occupants of the stalls to scandalized amazement. ”

“ At times, the canyon's mountain wall echoed the laughter of the little company as Sibyl and the novelist played their fantastical game of words; or again, the older people would listen to the blending voices of the artist and the girl as, in the quiet hush of the evening, they sang together to Myra Willard's accompaniment on the violin; or, perhaps, Sibyl, with her face upturned to the mountain tops, would make for her chosen friends the music of the hills. ”

“ The Sibyl speaks of the true God, to love whom brings blessing. The ungodly triumph for a while, as Assyria, Media, Phrygia, Greece, and Egypt had triumphed. Jerusalem will fall, and the Temple perish in flames, but retribution will follow, the earth will be desolated by the divine wrath, the race of men and cities and rivers will be reduced to smoky dust, unless moral amendment comes betimes. Then the Sibyl’s note changes into a prophecy of Messianic judgment and bliss. ”

“ THE SIBYL As Aeneas and the Sibyl pursued their way back to earth, he said to her, "Whether thou be a goddess or a mortal beloved of the gods, by me thou shalt always be held in reverence. When I reach the upper air I will cause a temple to be built to thy honor, and will myself bring offerings." "I am no goddess," said the Sibyl; "I have no claim to sacrifice or offering. I am mortal; yet if I could have accepted the love of Apollo I might have been immortal. ”

“ The Sibyl was a little lady endowed with an unusual share of that special variety of psychic faculty that makes the cheiromant, and also with a gift, almost rarer, of genuine enthusiasm for the good qualities of others, an innocent and whole-souled creator and worshipper of heroes, if ever there were one. ”