Bog myrtle

“ But the distance beckons us, and the sun draws himself upward to his strength. We have on us the English itch for change. The breeze comes and goes as we plunge among the groves of Virgilian ilex, and through the interstices of the trees we see on a hill-slope above us thirty great horned oxen, etched black against the sky. ”

“ In the opener glades of the woods the wild hyacinths lie in the hollows, in wreaths and festoons of smoke as blue as peat-reek. As we walk through them the dew in their bells swishes pleasantly about our ankles, and even those we have trodden upon rise up after we have passed, so thick do they grow and so full are they of the strength of the morning. ”

“ By two o'clock, however, there is a distinct brightening in the east, and pale, streaky cirrus cloudlets gather to bar the sun's way. Broad, equal-blowing airs begin to draw to and fro through the woods. There is an earthy scent of wet leaves, sharpened with an unmistakable aromatic whiff of garlic, which has been trodden upon and rises to reproach us for our carelessness. ”

“ When the green cool abyss of fathomless sky melts into pale slate-grey in the west, and the high tide of darkness pauses before it begins to ebb, then is the watershed of day and night. The real noon of night is quite an hour and a half after the witching hour, just as the depth of winter is really a month after the shortest day. ”

“ They rise to a great height, and drift with the light wind towards their feeding-grounds by the river. Over the hedge flashes a snipe, rising like a brown bomb-shell from between our feet, and sending the heart into the mouth. The heron, which we have seen far off, standing in the shallows, apparently meditating on the vanity of earthly affairs, slowly and laboriously takes to flight. He cannot rise for the matter of a stone's-throw, and the heavy flaps of his labouring wings resound in the still morning. There is no warier bird than the heron when he gets a fair field. ”

“ The snow swept down with a biting swirl as the groups scattered and the mourners vanished from each other's sight, diving singly into the eddying drifts as into a great tent of many flapping folds. Grave and quiet is the Scottish funeral, with a kind of simple manfulness as of men in the presence of the King of Terrors, but yet possessing that within them which enables every man of them to await without unworthy fear the Messenger who comes but once. ”

“ But indeed it takes much to chain a young man's fancy, when the road of life runs enticingly before him, dappled with laurel and carpeted with primrose.
It was our vagabond year, and, as I had foretold, a fair maid stood at every door, smiling at us and leading us on. We did not keep long by the dusty road. Presently we turned up byways, over which the prickly-pear and red valerian broke in profuse and unprecise beauty—fleshy-leaved creepers, too, as of a house-leek turned passion-flower, over-crowned all with scarlet blotches of cunningly placed colour. ”

“ The romances of high young blood, of maidens' winsome purity and frank disdain, of strong men who take their lives in hand and hurl themselves upon the push of pikes. And though I cannot grasp more than a hint of the plot, yet as my feet swish through the dewy swathes of the hyacinths or crisp along the frost-bitten snow, a wild thought quickens within me into a belief, that one day I shall hear them all, and tell these tales for my very own so that the world must listen. ”

“ And while she listened, the strange light of the leaves irradiated the youthful figure of Myrtle, as when the stained window let in its colors on Madeline, the rose-bloom and the amethyst and the glory.
“Yes! we shall be angels together,” exclaimed the Rev. Mr. Stoker. “Our souls were made for immortal union. I know it; I feel it in every throb of my heart. Even in this world you are as an angel to me, lifting me into the heaven where I shall meet you again, or it will not be heaven. Oh, if on earth our communion could have been such as it must be hereafter! O Myrtle, Myrtle!” ”

“ I don’t mean his behavior to you—but to Myrtle! He’s not half so spooney—I mean attentive—as he used to be, and I fear there’s a reason for it! (with significance) .
LADY F. Indeed!
SIR F. Yes! he may be smitten with somebody else! At his age the affections are fickle, volatile—skipping like a flea—
LADY F. Felix!
SIR F. I mean sipping like a bee from flower to flower! Myrtle is young—very young; but even youth like hers may become insipid! The love of every precocious boy of fifteen is a woman of thirty! ”

“ I think I can guess, Myrtle, that we have a little plan of some kind or other. We don't visit Papa Job quite so early as this without some special cause,—do we, Miss Keren-Happuch?”
“I want to go to the city—to school,” Myrtle said, with the directness which belonged to her nature.
“That is precisely what I want you to do myself, Miss Myrtle Hazard. I don't like to lose you from the village, but I think we must spare you for a while.”
“You're the best and dearest man that ever lived. What could have made you think of such a thing for me, Mr. Gridley?” ”

“ But he, he, he! out of the blood grow roses--beautiful red roses! garlands for you, for your darling! Oh, thou Lord of Life! what a beautiful angel comes to him, with the loveliest smiles, opening her lily arms to take him to her heart! Oh, Antonio, fortunate boy, play the man, play the man! and myrtle shall you gather in the sweet evening tide. Myrtle for your bride--for the virgin widow--he, he, he! Myrtle gathered in the red light of evening, to blossom in the deep midnight. List to the whisper of the night wind, to the longing sighs of the summer sea! ”

“ Miss Cynthia, a sharper-edged woman, had formed the habit of crushing everything for its moral, until it lost its sweetness and grew almost odious, as flower-de-luces do when handled roughly. “There's a worm in that leaf, Myrtle. He has rolled it all round him, and hidden himself from sight; but there is a horrid worm in it, for all it is so young and fresh. There is a worm in every young soul, Myrtle.” ”

“ So then Miss Myrtle began to tell her story, but kept looking down at her lap at first, being so bashful among such perfect strangers as the Hollow Tree people were to her at that time.
"Well," she said, "I wasn't born in the Big Deep Woods, nor in any woods at all, but in a house with a great many more of our family, a long way from here, and owned by a Mr. Man who raised us to sell." ”

“ If his object in these singular manoeuvres was to see Miss Minford, he always failed to improve the opportunity when it offered; for, as surely as Pet came out from the school, or turned into the street to go toward it, so surely did the boy Bog walk off whistling in another direction. Nobody can understand the motives of Bog's conduct, except those who have done the same thing in their youthful days. ”

“ Myrtle was a child of nature, and of course, according to the out-worn formulae which still shame the distorted religion of humanity, hateful to the Father in Heaven who made her. She had grown up in antagonism with all that surrounded her. ”

“ So Myrtle grew cleaner and prettier and happier every day. And strangers, walking upon the beach, often stopped to wonder at the strange loveliness of the little barefoot boy and girl, as they ran pattering along the sands with their wood-baskets. Rosebud, with her pleasant face and gentle ways, soon became a favorite with the children of the [77] shore. They were all eager to play with her, to help her pick up wood and moss among the rocks, to show her where the birds built, and often coaxed her to their huts, that the family at home might know this lovely little stranger. ”

“ The whisper continued: "They tell me your mamma's in the cem'tery, Myrtle. I've come home to lay alongside of her. I'm grain for the grim reaper's sickle. In death we sha'n't be divided; and I've walked half the way from Texas. Don't expect you'd want to kiss me. You look awful like her, Myrtle."
Tears rolled out of his eyes down his hollowed cheeks, which seemed almost black between the high bones. His pointed chin quivered. He made a wavering gesture of both hands and sat down on the floor. Behind Mrs. Egg the cook sobbed aloud. A farmhand stood on the grass by the outer steps, looking in. ”

“ He has never got over the fancy he took to her when he first saw her in her red jacket, and called her the fire-hang-bird. Wouldn't they suit each other by and by, after Myrtle has come to herself and grown into a beautiful and noble woman, as I feel sure she will in due time? ”

“ The donkey-chaise had got behind in climbing the hill at the entrance of the town, but it came up at this moment. John's basket fell from his hand, and fell heavily on the door-step, and he rushed towards it, crying,
"Father! father! how is it I see you here?"
"John,—my dear son!" cried the old man; and they grasped each other by both hands, and seemed to search in each other's faces for answers to many questions; and then Martha took hold of her brother's arm, and he remembered her, changed as she was from the merry, rosy girl he had left her. ”

“ Now Mistress Kitty Fagan was devoted, heart and soul, to Myrtle Hazard, and ever since she had received the young girl from Mr. Gridley's hands, when he brought her back safe and sound after her memorable adventure, had considered him as Myrtle's best friend and natural protector. These simple creatures, whose thoughts are not taken up, like those of educated people, with the care of a great museum of dead phrases, are very quick to see the live facts which are going on about them. ”

“ And if it could be that, after so many generations, the blood of her who had died for her faith could show in her descendants veins, and the soul of that elect lady of her race look out from her far-removed offspring's dark eyes, such a transfusion of the martyr's life and spiritual being might well seem to manifest itself in Myrtle Hazard.
The large-hearted old man forgot his scholastic theory of human nature as he looked upon her face. He thought he saw in her the dawning of that grace which some are born with; which some, like Myrtle, only reach through many trials and dangers ”

“ But with Myrtle it was a fixed belief that she felt perfectly distinct currents of her ancestral blood at intervals, and she had sometimes thought there were instincts and vague recollections which must have come from the old warriors and hunters and their dusky brides. The Indians who visited the neighborhood recognized something of their own race in her dark eyes, as the reader may remember they told the persons who were searching after her. It had almost frightened her sometimes to find how like a wild creature she felt when alone in the woods. ”

“ They had hardly drawn up at the Arcade amid a gathering of small urchins, when a great limousine came superbly up and a familiar voice cried in great excitement:
“Inga! Inga!”
The next moment, the Myrtle Popper, which had been, came flying rapturously toward them, in the figure of a stylishly dressed woman in half mourning. From the limousine, more slowly, King O’Leary descended, somewhat embarrassed at being thus surprised.
“Mr. Dangerfield, how well you look! Inga, how pretty you’ve grown!” cried Myrtle, embracing her. ”

“ I have seen you very often, Bog. How do you like the business?" said Marcus, pleasantly.
"Very well, sir, thank you," replied Bog, with his eyes still on the floor, "'cept when the boys poke fun at us; 'cos we can't run after 'em in them boxes, and wollop 'em. 'S rather hard, that." Bog caught Miss Minford's eye as he concluded these remarks, and blushed till he perspired, to think that he should have dropped such a brutal observation in presence of that young lady. ”

“ SIR F. Is that all?
ARTH. All! It strikes me as being quite enough. No, it isn’t all—it’s only half, for Myrtle—
SIR F. (cutting him short) . Never mind Myrtle; I know all about her. She thinks you a bit of a milksop—s—so do I; that you’ve no energy—not an atom! no will of your own—never had! and that in order to reinstate yourself in her good opinion you must do something desperate! So you shall! Now what do you mean to do?
ARTH. Show a proper spirit, and—run away!
SIR F. Run away! Certainly not—fling yourself into my arms and I’ll pull you through! So cheer up! ”

“ The Debutante's name was Myrtle. Her Parents were very Watchful, and did not encourage her to receive Callers, except such as were known to be Exemplary Young Men. Fred and Eustace were a few of those who escaped the Black List. Myrtle always appeared to be glad to see them, and they regarded her as a Darned Swell Girl.
MYRTLE
Fred's Cousin came from St. Paul on a Visit; and one Day, in the Street, he saw Myrtle, and noticed that Fred tipped his Hat, and gave her a Stage Smile. ”

“ This may have been from the deep interest he felt in Myrtle's spiritual welfare; but he had often been sent for by aged sinners in more immediate peril, apparently, without any such disturbance of the circulation.
To know whether a minister, young or still in flower; is in safe or dangerous paths, there are two psychometers, a comparison between which will give as infallible a return as the dry and wet bulbs of the ingenious “Hygrodeik.” The first is the black broadcloth forming the knees of his pantaloons ”

“ Myrtle Street does not waste much time in tracing the whereabouts of unfortunate acquaintances, nor in thinking of them after they drift out of sight under the ever-mounting wave of disaster which laps hungrily thereabout. But Maggie in a big bonnet, with her eyes closed and kneeling in the mud, was enough to arouse Myrtle Street’s benumbed curiosity. So the bedraggled woman on the sidewalk pressed quite close to the curb and stared at her, wondering vaguely at the transformation. ”

“ Instead of the claw-feet common in furniture of a later date, each of its legs rested on a misshapen reptile, which it seemed to flatten by its weight, as if it were squeezing the breath out of the ugly creature. Over this chair hung the portrait of her beautiful ancestress, her neck and arms, the specialty of her beauty, bare, except for a bracelet on the left wrist, and her shapely figure set off by the ample folds of a rich crimson brocade. Over Myrtle's bed hung that other portrait, which was to her almost as the pictures of the Mater Dolorosa to trustful souls of the Roman faith. ”