Fallen woman

“ The wailing of the women tells the story of a death, as they abandon themselves completely to their sorrow, tearing their hair, striking their foreheads, and uttering shrill cries to show their desolation. As soon as the breath leaves the body preparations are made at once for its disposal, as a corpse is never kept longer than twenty-four hours in this hot climate. The eldest son, if there is one of suitable age, or the father or eldest brother in order of nearest relationship, or the husband if the deceased is a woman, must conduct the funeral ceremonies. ”

“ When Death should come for that one who was, in everything but blood, her mother and who was, now, her only companion—what then? To be left alone in the world—to go, alone, all the rest of the journey—this was the horror that Death brought to her. As she looked, that afternoon, into the years that were to come, this woman, who knew that she was a woman, and who was still in the glory and beauty of her young womanhood, felt suddenly old—she felt as though every day of the sad days just passed had been a year. ”

“ She knelt in a pink flannel nightgown, her thin hair down her back, her forehead as full of horror as a mask of tragedy, while she identified her love for the Son of God with her love for a mortal, and wondered if any other woman had ever been so sacrilegious. ”

“ The girl burst into a storm of tears, sinking to the ground in her grief and despair, and burying her face on a pile of cushions. Still the dreamer, suffering torture herself, was helpless to relieve the other. Then suddenly the girl sprang up, and, dashing the tears from her eyes, which now seemed to blaze with murderous resolve, she sprang upon the white woman, enlaced her throat with supple brown fingers, pressed and pressed, tighter and tighter—ah, God! the horror and the suffocating pain of it—and all the while the sleeper’s hands seemed tied to her side. ”

“ And the dead woman, the woman who had spent her life in warding off this danger, took shape also to my imagination, and I saw her as a shadowy but beautiful presence which intervened for ever with arms uplifted to screen the man whom she loved. ”

“ He knew she was beautiful, with an imperiousness of manner she took from him, and a sweet yielding graciousness she took from her mother. Sometimes a smile, or turn of her head, or kindling in her eyes, would bring the dead woman so vividly to his mind that he would rise suddenly and leave the room, as if a ghost were haunting him. ”

“ Why wait to say these words over a coffin wherein lies a wasted, weary, gray-haired woman, whose eyes have so long held that pathetic story of loss and suffering and patient yearning, which so many women's eyes reveal to those who weep? Why not have made the wilderness in her heart blossom like the rose with the prodigality of your love? Now you would give worlds, were they yours to give, to see the tears of joy your words would have once caused, bejeweling the closed windows of her soul. ”

“ Should she when at last she lay dying, for though the attempt to realize the inevitableness of death caught the breath and eluded the mind's grasp, the ultimate death of herself was a fact that must be believed, should she in that solemn hour ask a granddaughter—Richard's or dear fat Geoffrey's child—such questions as her own grandmother had asked her? Should she when an old woman look back at her life with doubt and forward to the grave with apprehension? ”

“ Heaven knows what fearsome tales she had heard that morning while the young lady lodgers sat on her bed discussing criminal atrocities and prison terrors, nor how her anguish was augmented by the widow’s pale face, and the widow’s tears which were braided into her back hair. No one could know the exact cause, but the result was evident in a tiny face as stony and terror stricken as that of a sensitive woman doomed to see her best loved sentenced to death. ”

“ But the terror had almost gone.
“ ‘Forget that I’m a man and you’re a woman,’ he continued in the most beseeching voice I ever heard. ‘Forget that I’m a ghost, and come out boldly and press me to you with a great kiss, and let your love flow into me. Forget yourself just for one minute and do a brave thing! Oh, love me, love me, love me! ”

“ That revolted cry Is sobbed in by a woman’s voice forlorn,— Thy woman’s hair, my sister! all unshorn, Floats back dishevelled, strength in agony, Disproving thy man’s name: And while before The world thou burnest in a poet-fire, We see thy woman’s heart beat evermore Through the large flame. ”

“ I was haunted with horrific dreams; and when, in few days, among the "accidents" the death of an unknown woman was recorded, whose body had drifted ashore at night, and I recognized by the description poor, unknown, uncared-for Madame C——, a wild fever burned in my veins, a frenzy of anguish akin to remorse, as if I had wronged the dead, and sent her drifting, helpless, out to the unknown world. ”

“ just such tears, sir, as you dropped into the coffin where lay your first-born son; such tears, woman, as you shed when you heard the cries of your dying babe. For, sir, he was a man,—and you are but another man. And, woman, though dressed in silk and jewels, you are but a woman, and, in life's great straits and mighty griefs, ye feel but one sorrow! ”

“ Then there is the ghost of the woman who cries outside in the shrubbery. I have seen her myself in a glint of the moonlight, her black hair covering her face as she bends to the earth, incessantly seeking something among the dead leaves, which she cannot discover, and for which she cries. ”

“ So she sits when her uncle visits her, and tries every means in his power to awaken a smile, or bring one look of animation into that dead face. Yes, it is the face of a dead woman. Dead to hope, dead to love, dead to the past; still more utterly dead to a future, which, since it cannot restore the dead, can give her nothing. ”

“ Over the corpse of the other woman the girl rushes into the arms of the man, who can belong to her for the few hours left to him. And after all these breathless events, she remains alone, bewildered, as if after a heavy dream. She lives on and cannot understand that there is still room for her in the world, with all her crime and grief and joy. ”

“ The death of this amiable and excellent woman is severely felt by a numerous circle of relatives and friends. As a daughter and a sister, wife and mother, her loss is deeply deplored, for in all these various relations she was affectionate, tender, and truly estimable. But the tear of sorrow is almost dried by the reflection that she lived the life and died the death of the righteous. Modest and unassuming, possessing the most engaging simplicity of manners, her heart was the residence of every kind affection, and glowed with sympathy for the wants and sufferings of others. ”

“ Miss Frost wept in anguish, and saw nothing but another woman betrayed to sorrow and a slow death. Sorrow and a slow death, because a man had married her. Miss Frost wept also for herself, for her own sorrow and slow death. Sorrow and slow death, because a man had not married her. Wretched man, what is he to do with these exigeant and never-to-be-satisfied women? ”

“ Then her body shook and her breast heaved strongly, almost throwing her upon her side as she lay, and sounds that were hardly human came from her lips; for the first dissolving of a woman's despair into tears is most like the death agony of those who die young in their strength, when the limbs are wrung at the joints and the light breaks in the upturned eyes, when the bosom heaves and would take in the whole world at one breath, when the voice makes sounds of fear that are beyond words and worse to hear than any words could be. ”

“ Most of all was he moved by the sorrow of her face. She might serve for Niobe with her children dead; she might serve for Hecuba over the bodies of Polyxena and Polydore. The sorrows of woman have ever been greater than those of man. The widow suffers more than the widower; the bereaved mother than the bereaved father. The ideals of grief are found in the faces of women, and reach their intensity in the woe that meets our eyes in the Mater Dolorosa. This woman was one of the great community of sufferers, and anguish both past and present still left its traces on her face. ”

“ Tragedy was there in its most terrible, its most pathetic, aspect. The pathos was given by the victim,—a young and pretty girl lying face upward on the tessellated floor with an arrow in her breast and death stamped unmistakably on every feature,—the terror by the look and attitude of the woman they saw kneeling over her—a remarkable woman, no longer young, but of a presence to hold the attention, even if the circumstances had been of a far less tragic nature. ”

“ Years have passed, but the pain lingers and when the thoughts go back to the silent form in the little white casket the tender heart of this pure woman is so engulfed in sorrow that it seems it is entirely beyond all human endurance and patience. ”

“ When the women reached this scene they shrieked as though bereft of all their kindred, but the majority of them were forced to admit that they knew no one among the dead. Occasionally some agonized mother or wife recognized the charred remains of a loved one, and the woman wept as only a woman can weep. ”

“ Let there be light in the house of Isom Chase, and in the sharp espionage of curious eyes, for dark days hang over it, and the young widow who draws the pity of all because she cannot weep.
No matter how hard a woman’s life with a man has been, when he dies she is expected to mourn. ”

“ They will think that I went away in my mourning dress, which they will miss. If they describe me, they will describe a lady in deep mourning. If any one comes in pursuit, they will look for a young woman in black, and pass me by, because I shall wear gray and keep my vail down. ”

“ The question is asked, but no one will answer it, nor will any say who the woman is that so often visits the cemetery at the stroke of midnight and sounds the call into the chamber of the dead. Starlight, moonlight, or storm—it makes no difference to the woman. There she goes, in her black cloak, seen dim in the night, except where there are snow and moon together, and there she waits, her hand on the knocker, for the bell to strike to set up her clangor. Some say that she is crazy, and it is her freak to do this thing. Is she calling on the corpses to rise and have a dance among the graves? ”

“ False woman, in ages to come,
thy malice detested shall be,
And when we are cold in the tomb
some heart will still sorrow for me.
Ye roofs where cold damps and dismay,
with silence and fortitude dwell,
how comfortable passes the day?
how sadly tolls the evening bell?
The owls from the battlement cry;
hollow winds seem to murmur around,
O MARY ! prepare for to die
my blood it runs cold at the sound.
This work was published before January 1, 1929, and is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago. ”

“ I flung open my arms to embrace her, the woman of all women in the world I loved best, the only woman I had loved. Shrinking from my touch, she cowered against the side of the tent. I fell on my knees before her and kissed—what? Not the feet of my mother, but that of the long unburied dead. Sick with repulsion and fear I looked up, and there, bending over and peering into my eyes was the face, the fleshless, mouldering face of a foul and barely recognisable corpse! With a shriek of horror I rolled backwards, and, springing to my feet, prepared to fly. I glanced at the mummy. ”

“ For a woman to dream that night overtakes her in a graveyard, and she can find no place to sleep but in an open grave, foreshows she will have much sorrow and disappointment through death or false friends. She may lose in love, and many things seek to work her harm.
To see a graveyard barren, except on top of the graves, signifies much sorrow and despondency for a time, but greater benefits and pleasure await you if you properly shoulder your burden.
To see your own corpse in a grave, foreshadows hopeless and despairing oppression. ”

“ I gave a gasp and pulled off more cushions, then I fell on my knees, struck down by the greatest horror which a man can feel. Death lay before me—violent, uncalled-for death—and the victim was a woman. ”

“ Laid his hand upon her head:
Thy sorrow is great, O woman!
I sorrow with thee," he said.
"The paths to trouble are many
And never but one sure way
Leads out to the light beyond it:
My poor wife, let us pray." ”

“ And then you try to soothe her; but you find her a woman who yawns like an open box, who complains of her chest, who begins to weep anew, who implores you to leave her to her melancholy and her mournful memories. She talks to you about her last wishes, follows her own funeral, is buried, plants over her tomb the green canopy of a weeping willow, and at the very time when you would like to raise a joyful epithalamium, you find an epitaph to greet you all in black. ”

“ With these words the dying woman handed the mirror to her daughter.
The mind of the good mother seemed to be now at rest, and sinking back without another word her spirit passed quietly away that day.
The bereaved father and daughter were wild with grief, and they abandoned themselves to their bitter sorrow. They felt it to be impossible to take leave of the loved woman who till now had filled their whole lives and to commit her body to the earth. ”

“ Strange fantasy! It was but the shadow of the fringed curtain waving betwixt the dead face and the moonlight as the door of the chamber opened and a girl stole softly to the bedside. Was there delusion in the moonbeams, or did her gesture and her eye betray a gleam of triumph as she bent over the pale corpse, pale as itself, and pressed her living lips to the cold ones of the dead? As she drew back from that long kiss her features writhed as if a proud heart were fighting with its anguish. Again it seemed that the features of the corpse had moved responsive to her own. Still an illusion. ”