CHAPTER XII.

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“Then crush, even in their hour of birth, The infant buds of love, And tread his glowing fire to earth, Ere ’tis dark in clouds above.” Halleck.

The observance of the Sabbath began with the Puritans, as it still does with a great portion of their descendants, on Saturday night. At the going down of the sun on Saturday, all temporal affairs were suspended; and so zealously did our fathers maintain the letter as well as the spirit of the law, that, according to a vulgar tradition in Connecticut, no beer was brewed in the latter part of the week, lest it should presume to _work_ on Sunday.

It must be confessed that the tendency of the age is to laxity; and so rapidly is the wholesome strictness of primitive times abating, that, should some antiquary, fifty years hence, in exploring his garret rubbish, chance to cast his eye on our humble pages, he may be surprised to learn that even now the Sabbath is observed, in the interior of New-England, with an almost Judaical strictness.

On Saturday afternoon an uncommon bustle is apparent. The great class of procrastinators are hurrying to and fro to complete the lagging business of the week. The good mothers, like Burns’s matron, {232} are plying their needles, making “auld claes look amaist as weel’s the new;” while the domestics, or help[4] (we prefer the national descriptive term), are wielding with might and main their brooms and _mops_, to make all _tidy_ for the Sabbath.

As the day declines, the hum of labour dies away, and after the sun is set, perfect stillness reigns in every well-ordered household, and not a footfall is heard in the village street. It cannot be denied, that even the most spiritual, missing the excitement of their ordinary occupations, anticipate their usual bedtime. The obvious inference from this fact is skilfully avoided by certain ingenious reasoners, who allege that the constitution was originally so organized as to require an extra quantity of sleep on every seventh night. We recommend it to the curious to inquire how this peculiarity was adjusted when the first day of the week was changed from Saturday to Sunday.

The Sabbath morning is as peaceful as the first hallowed day. Not a human sound is heard without the dwellings, and, but for the lowing of the herds, the crowing of the cocks, and the gossiping of the birds, animal life would seem to be extinct, till, at the bidding of the church-going bell, the old and young issue from their habitations, and with solemn demeanour bend their measured steps to the _meeting-house_. The family of the minister--the squire--the doctor--the merchants--the modest gentry of the {233} village, and the mechanic and labourer, all arrayed in their best, all meeting on even ground, and all with that consciousness of independence and equality which breaks down the pride of the rich, and rescues the poor from servility, envy, and discontent. If a morning salutation is reciprocated, it is in a suppressed voice; and if, perchance, Nature, in some reckless urchin, burst forth in laughter, “My dear, you forget it’s Sunday!” is the ever ready reproof.

Though every face wears a solemn aspect, yet we once chanced to see even a deacon’s muscles relaxed by the wit of a neighbour, and heard him allege, in a half deprecating, half laughing voice, “The squire is so droll that a body must laugh, though it be Sabbath-day.”

The farmer’s ample wagon and the little one-horse vehicle bring in all who reside at an inconvenient walking distance; that is to say, in our riding community, half a mile from the church. It is a pleasing sight to those who love to note the happy peculiarities of their own land, to see the farmer’s daughters, blooming, intelligent, and well bred, pouring out of these homely coaches with their nice white gowns, prunello shoes, Leghorn hats, fans, and parasols, and the spruce young men with their plaited ruffles, blue coats, and yellow buttons. The whole community meet as one religious family, to offer their devotions at the common altar. If there is an outlaw from the society--a luckless wight, whose vagrant taste has never been subdued, he may be seen stealing along the margin of some little brook, far away {234} from the condemning observation and troublesome admonitions of his fellows.

Towards the close of the day, or (to borrow a phrase descriptive of his feeling who first used it) “when the Sabbath begins to _abate_,” the children cluster about the windows. Their eyes wander from their catechisms to the western sky; and though it seems to them as if the sun would never disappear, his broad disk does slowly sink behind the mountain; and while his last ray still lingers on the eastern summit, merry voices break forth, and the ground resounds with bounding footsteps. The village belle arrays herself for her twilight walk; the boys gather on “the green;” the lads and girls throng to the “singing-school;” while some coy maiden lingers at home, awaiting her expected suiter; and all enter upon the pleasures of the evening with as keen a relish as if the day had been a preparatory penance.

We have passed over eight days, which glided away without supplying any events to the historian of our heroine’s life, though even then the thread was spinning that was to form the woof of her destiny.

Intent on verifying the prediction she had made to Esther, that Everell would soon declare himself her lover, she promoted the intercourse of the parties in every way she could without making her motive apparent. While she treated Everell with frank sisterly affection, and was always easy and animated in his society, which she enjoyed above all other pleasures, she sedulously sought to bring Esther’s {235} moral and mental graces forth to the light. In their occasional walks she took good care that Everell should be the companion of her friend, while she permitted Sir Philip Gardiner to attend her. He was a man of the world, practised in all the arts of society; and though he sometimes offended her by the excess of his flattering gallantries, yet he often deeply interested her with his lively descriptions of countries and manners unknown to her.

It was just at twilight on Saturday evening when the elder Mr. Fletcher came into Madam Winthrop’s parlour, found his son sitting there alone, and interrupted a very delightful meditation on the eloquence of Hope Leslie, who had just been with him, descanting on the virtues of her friend Esther. The charms of the fair speaker had, we believe, a far larger share of his thoughts than the subject of her harangue.

“We have a lecture extraordinary to-night,” said Mr. Fletcher; “our rulers, some time since, issued an order, limiting our regular religious meetings to one during the week. Shall you go, my son?”

“Sir! go to the lecture?” replied Everell, as it just waking from a dream; and then added, for then he caught a glimpse of Hope through the door with her hat and mantle, “oh, yes; certainly, sir, I shall go to the lecture.”

He snatched his hat, and would have joined Miss Leslie; but she saw his intention, and turning to him as she passed the threshold of the door, she said, “You need not go with me, Everell; I have to call for aunt Grafton, at Mrs. Cotton’s.”

{236}

“May I not call with you?”

“No; I had rather you would not,” she said, decidedly, and hurried away without any explanation of her preference.

“What can have disturbed Hope?” asked Mr. Fletcher, for both he and his son had observed that her cheek was flushed and her eye tearful.

“I cannot imagine,” replied Everell; “she left me, not half an hour since, all smiles and gayety.”

“It is but the April-temper of youth,” said the father. “Hope is of a feeling make: she often reminds me of the Delta lands, where the fruits spring forth before the waters have retired. Smiles are playing on her lips before the tear is dry on her cheek. But this sensitiveness should be checked: the dear child’s feelings have too long been indulged.”

“And as long as they are all innocent, sir, why should they not be indulged?”

“Because, my son, she must be hardened for the cross-accidents and unkind events, or, rather, I should say, the wholesome chastisements of life. She cannot--we can none of us--expect indulgence from the events of life.” Mr. Fletcher paused for a moment, looked around, then shut the door and returned to his son. “Everell,” he said, “you have ever been dutiful to me.”

“And ever shall be, my dear father,” replied Everell, with frank confidence, little thinking how soon the virtue might become difficult.

“Trust not, my son, to thine own strength; it may {237} soon be put to a test that will make thee feel it to be but weakness. Everell, thou seest that Hope loves thee even as she loved thee in thy childhood. Let her affection remain of this temper, I charge thee, as thou respectest thy father’s and thine own honour. And, Everell, it were well if you fixed your eye on--”

“Stop, sir! stop, I beseech you, and tell me--not because I have any thoughts--any intentions, I mean--any formed purpose, I would say--but tell me, I entreat you, why this prohibition?”

Everell spoke with such earnestness and ingenuousness that his father could not refuse to answer him; but his reasons seemed, even to himself, to lose half their force as they emerged from their shroud of mystery. He acknowledged, in the first place, what his most cherished wishes had been in relation to Hope and Everell. He then communicated the intimations that had been thrown out, that his views for his son were mercenary.

Everell laughed at the idea. “No one,” he said, “can so well afford such an imputation as you, sir, whose whole life has been a practical refutation of it; and, for my own part, I am satisfied with the consciousness that I would not marry any woman with a fortune whom I would not marry if the case were reversed, or even if we were both penniless.”

“I believe this is not an empty boast, my son; but we have set ourselves up as a mark to the world, and, as Brother Winthrop has said, and repeated to me, we cannot be too solicitous to avoid all appearance of evil. There are covetous souls, who, on the {238} slightest ground, would suspect us of pursuing our own worldly by-ends.”

“And so, sir, to win the approbation, or, rather, the good word of these covetous souls, we are to degrade ourselves to their level, and act as if we were capable of their mean passions.”

“Everell, my son, you speak presumptuously; we are capable of all evil; but we will waive that question at present. Our individual wishes must be surrendered to the public good. We have laid the foundation of an edifice, and our children must be so coupled together as to secure its progress and stability when the present builders are laid low.”

“And so, my dear father, a precious gem is to be mortared in like a common brick, wherever may best suit the purposes and views of the builders. You are displeased, sir. Perhaps I spoke somewhat hastily. But, once for all, I entreat you not to dispose of us as if we were mere machines: we owe you our love and reverence.”

“And obedience, Everell.”

“Yes, sir, as far as can be manifested by not doing what you command us not to do.”

“Have I, then, strained parental authority so far, that you think it necessary thus to qualify your duty?”

“No, indeed, my dear father; and it is because your authority has ever been too gentle to be felt, that I wince at the galling of a new yoke. You will admit that my submission has not been less perfect for being voluntary. Trust me, then, for the future; and I promise--”

{239}

Everell was, perhaps, saved from rashly committing himself by the entrance of Madam Winthrop, who inquired if the gentlemen were ready to attend her to the lecture.

“Come, Mr. Everell,” she said, “here is Esther to show you the way, than whom there can be no safer guide.”

Miss Downing stood beside her aunt, but she shrunk back at Everell’s approach, hurt at what seemed to her a solicitation for his attention. He perceived her instinctive movement, but, without appearing to notice it, he offered his arm to Madam Winthrop, saying, “As there is no skill in guiding one quite capable of self-guidance, I will not inflict myself on Miss Downing, if you will allow me the honour of attending you.”

Madam Winthrop submitted with the best grace to this cross purpose. The elder Fletcher offered his arm to Miss Downing, and endeavoured to draw her into conversation; but she was timid, downcast, and reserved; and mentally comparing her with Hope Leslie, he felt how improbable it was that Everell would ever prefer her. The old, even when grave and rigid, are said to affect the young and gay; on the same principle, perhaps, that a dim eye delights in bright colours.

“Is that Gorton’s company?” asked Everell, pointing towards several prisoners, who, in the custody of a file of soldiers, appeared to be going towards the sanctuary.

“Yes,” replied Madam Winthrop; “the governor {240} and our ruling elders have determined that, as they are to be tried next week, they shall have the benefit of all our public teaching in the mean time.”

“I should fear they would deem this punishment before trial,” said Everell.

“They did reluct mightily at first; but on being promised that, if they had occasion to speak, after sermon they should be permitted, provided they only spoke the words of sobriety and truth, they consented to come forth.”

This Gorton, whom Hubbard calls “a prodigious minister of exorbitant novelties,” had been brought, with his adherents, from Rhode Island, by force of arms, to be tried for certain civil and ecclesiastical offences, for which, according to the most learned antiquary of our New World (Mr. Savage), they were not amenable to the magistracy of Massachusetts.

The prisoners were ushered into the church, and placed before the ruling elders. The governor then entered, unattended by his halberd-bearers (a ceremony dispensed with except on Sunday), and, followed by his family, walked slowly to his pew, where Miss Leslie was already seated between Mrs. Grafton and Sir Philip Gardiner. She rose, and contrived to exchange her location for one next Miss Downing. “Look, Esther,” she said, in a whisper, to her friend, “at that lad who stands in the corner of the gallery, just beside the lamp.”

“I see him; but what of him?”

“Why, just observe how he gazes at me: his eye {241} is like a burning-glass--it really scorches me. I wish the service were over. Do you think it will be long?”

“It may be long, but I trust not tedious,” replied Esther, with a gravity which was the harshest rebuke she could ever command.

“Oh, it will be both!” said Hope, in a despairing tone; “for there is Mr. Wheeler in the pulpit, and he always talks of eternity till he forgets time.”

“My dear Hope!” said Esther, in a voice of mingled surprise and reproof.

The service presently began, and Hope endeavoured dutifully to assume a decorous demeanour, and join Esther in singing the psalm; but her mind was soon abstracted, and her voice died away.

The preacher had not proceeded far in his discourse before all her patience was exhausted. Even those who are the most strenuous advocates for the passive duties of the sanctuary might have bestowed their pity on our heroine, who had really serious cause for her feverish impatience; obliged to sit, while a young man, accounted a “universal scholar,” seemed determined, like many unfledged preachers, to tell all he knew in that one discourse, which was then called a prophesying--an extempore effusion. He was bent, not only on making “root and branch work” of poor Gorton’s heresies, but on eradicating every tare from the spiritual field. To Hope he appeared to maintain one even pace straight forward, like the mortal in the fairy tale, sentenced to an eternal walk over a boundless plain.

{242}

“Do, Esther, look at the candles,” she whispered; “don’t you think it must be nine o’clock?”

“Oh, hush! no, not yet eight.”

Hope sighed audibly, and once more resumed a listening attitude. All human labours have their end, and therefore had the preacher’s. But, alas for our heroine! when he had finished, Gorton--whose face for the last hour had expressed that he felt much like a criminal condemned to be scourged before he is hung--Gorton rose, and, smarting under a sense of wrongs, repeated all the points of the discourse, and made points where there were none; refuted and attacked, and proved (to his own satisfaction) “that all ordinances, ministers, sacraments, &c., were but men’s invention--silver shrines of Diana.”

While this self-styled “professor of mysteries” spoke, Hope was so much interested in his genuine enthusiasm and mysticism (for he was the Swedenborg of his day) that she forgot her own secret subject of anxiety; but when he had finished, and half a dozen of the ruling elders rose at the same moment to prove the weapons of orthodoxy upon the arch heretic, she whispered to Esther, “I can never bear this; I must make an apology to Madam Winthrop, and go home!”

“Stay,” said Esther; “do you not see Mr. Cotton is getting up?”

Mr. Cotton, the regular pastor, rose to remind his brethren of the decree, “that private members should be very sparing in their questions and observations {243} after public sermons,” and to say that he should postpone any farther discussion of the precious points before them, as it was near nine o’clock, after which it was not suitable for any Christian family to be unnecessarily abroad.

Hope now, and many others, instinctively rose, in anticipation of the dismissing benediction; but Mr. Cotton waved his hand for them to sit down, till he could communicate to the congregation the decision to which the ruling elders and himself had come on the subject of the last Sabbath sermon. “He would not repeat what he had before said upon that lust of costly apparel, which was fast gaining ground, and had already, as was well known, crept into godly families. He was pleased that there were among them gracious women, ready to turn at a rebuke, as was manifested in many veils being left at home, that were floating over the congregation like so many butterflies’ wings in the morning. Economy, he justly observed, was, as well as simplicity, a Christian grace; and, therefore, the rulers had determined, that those persons who had run into the excess of immoderate veils and sleeves, embroidered caps, and gold and silver lace, should be permitted to wear them out, but new ones should be forfeited.”

This sumptuary regulation announced, the meeting was dismissed.

Madam Winthrop whispered to Everell that she was going, with his father, to look in upon a sick neighbour, and would thank him to see her niece home. Everell stole a glance at Hope, and dutifully offered his arm to Miss Downing.

{244}

Hope, intent only on one object, was hurrying out of the pew, intending, in the jostling of the crowd, to escape alone; but she was arrested by Madam Winthrop’s saying, “Miss Leslie, Sir Philip offers you his arm;” and, at the same moment, her aunt stooped forward to beg her to wait a moment, till she could send a message to Deacon Knowles’s wife, that she might wear her new gown with the Turkish sleeves the next day.

“Oh, martyrdom!” thought Hope, with, indeed, little of the spirit of a martyr. She dared not speak aloud, but she continued to whisper to Mrs. Grafton, “For pity’s sake, do leave Mrs. Knowles to take care of herself; I am tired to death with staying here.”

“No wonder,” replied her aunt, in the same low tone; “it is enough to tire Job himself; but just have a minute’s patience, deary; it is but doing as a body would be done by, to let Mistress Knowles know she may come out in her new gown to-morrow.”

“Well, just as you please, ma’am; but I will go along with Sir Philip, and you can follow with Mr. Cradock. Mr. Cradock, you will wait for Mrs. Grafton?”

“Surely, surely,” replied the good man, eagerly; “there is nothing you could ask me, Miss Hope, as you well know--be it ever so disagreeable--that I would not do.”

“Thank you for nothing, Mr. Cradock,” said the dame, with a toss of her head; “you are over {245} civil, I think, to-night. It is very well, Miss Hope, it is very well; you may go: you know Cradock, at best, is purblind at night; but it is very well; you can go; I can get home alone. It is very peculiar of you, Mr. Cradock.”

Poor Cradock saw he had offended, but how he knew not; and he looked imploringly to Hope to extricate him; but she was too anxious about her own affairs to lend her usual benevolent care to his embarrassment.

“My dear aunt,” said she, “I will not go without you, if you prefer to go with me; only do let us go.”

Mrs. Grafton now acquiesced, for in her flurry she had lost sight of the messenger whom she intended to intrust with the important errand. Sir Philip arranged her hood and cloak with a grace that she afterward said “was so like her dear deceased,” and in a few moments the party was in the street, and really moving homeward.

Mrs. Grafton prided herself on a slow, measured step, which she fancied was the true gait of dignity. Hope, on the contrary, always moved as the spirit moved her; and now she felt an irresistible impulse to hurry forward.

“My dear,” said her aunt, “how can you fly so? I am sure, if they in England were to see you walk, they would think you had been brought up here to chase the deer in the woods.”

Hope dared not confess her anxiety to get forward, and she could no longer check it.

“It is very undignified, and very unladylike, and {246} very unbecoming, Hope; and I must say it is untoward and unfroward of you to hurry me along so. Don’t you think it is very peculiar of Hope, Sir Philip?”

The knight suspected that Miss Leslie’s haste was merely impatience of his society, and he could scarcely curb his chagrin while he said that “the young lady undoubtedly moved with uncommon celerity; indeed, he had before suspected she had invisible wings.”

“Thank you for your hint, Sir Philip,” exclaimed Hope. “It is a night,” she continued, looking up at the bright moon, “to make one long to soar; so I will just spread my wings, and leave you to crawl on the earth.” She withdrew her arm from Sir Philip’s, and, tripping on before them, she soon turned a corner and was out of sight.

We must leave the knight biting his lips with vexation, and feeling much like a merchant obliged to pay a heavy duty on a lost article. However, to do him justice, he did not make an entire loss of it, but so adroitly improved the opportunity to win the aunt’s favour, that she afterward said to Hope, that, if she must see her wedded to a Puritan, she trusted it would be Sir Philip, for he had nothing of the Puritan but the outside.

Hope had not proceeded far when she heard a quick step behind her, and, looking back, she saw the young man whose gaze had disturbed her at the lecture. She had an indefinite womanly feeling of fear; but a second thought told her she had best {247} conceal it, and she slackened her pace. Her pursuer approached till he was parallel to her, and slackened his also. He looked at her without speaking; and, as Hope glanced her eye at him, she was struck with an expression of wretchedness and passion that seemed unnatural on a countenance so young and beautiful. “Anything is better than this strange silence,” thought Hope; so she stopped, looked the stranger full in the face, and said, inquiringly, “You have, perhaps, lost your way?”

“Lost my way?” replied the youth, in a half articulate voice: “yes, lady, I have lost my way.”

The melancholy tone and mysterious look of the stranger led Hope to suspect that he meant to convey more than the natural import of his words; but, without seeming to understand more, she said, “I perceive, by your foreign accent, that you are a stranger here. If you will tell me where you wish to go, I will direct you.”

“And who will guide _you_, lady?” responded the stranger, in a thrilling tone. “The lost may warn, but cannot guide.”

“I need no guidance,” said Hope, hastily, still persisting in understanding him literally: “I am familiar with the way; and, if I cannot be of service to you, must bid you good-night.”

“Stop one moment!” exclaimed the stranger, laying his hand on Hope’s arm with an imploring look: “you look so good--so kind--you may be of service to me;” and then bursting into a passionate flood of tears, he added, “Oh! no, no, there is no help for me!”

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Hope now lost all thought for herself in concern for the unhappy being before her. “Who or what are you?” she asked.

“I! what am I?” he replied, in a bitter tone; “Sir Philip Gardiner’s slave, or servant, or page, or--whatever he is pleased to call me. Nay, lady, look not so piteously on me! I love my master--at least I did love him; but I think innocence is the breath of love! Heaven’s mercy, lady! you will make me weep again if you look at me thus.”

“Nay, do not weep, but tell me,” said Hope, “what I can do for you; I cannot remain here longer.”

“Oh! you can do nothing for me--no one can do anything for me. But, lady--take care for thyself.”

“What do you mean?” demanded Hope, in a tone of mingled alarm and impatience; “do you mean anything?”

The boy looked apprehensively about him, and, approaching his lips close to Hope’s ear, he said in a whisper, “Promise me you will not love my master. Do not believe him, though he pledge the word of a true knight always to love you; though he swear it on the holy crucifix, do not believe it!”

Hope now began to think that the youth’s senses were impaired; and, more impatient than ever to escape from him, she said, “Oh, I can promise all that, and as much more in the same way as you will ask of me. But leave me now, and come to me again when you want a much more difficult service.”

{249}

“I never shall want anything else, lady,” he replied, shaking his head mournfully; “I want nothing else but that you would pity me! You may--for angels pity, and I am sure you look like one. Pity me! never speak of me, and forget me.” He dropped on his knee, pressed her hand to his lips, rose to his feet, and left her so hastily that she was scarcely conscious of his departure till he was beyond her sight.

Whatever matter for future reflection this interview might have afforded her, Hope had now no time to dwell on it; and she hastened forward, and surmounting a fence at the southeastern extremity of the burial-ground, entered the enclosure now the churchyard of the stone chapel. The moon was high in the heavens; masses of black clouds were driven by a spring gale over her bright disk, producing startling changes, from light to darkness, and from darkness to that gleamy, indefinite, illusive brightness, which gives to moonlight its dominion over the imagination.

At another time Hope Leslie would have shrunk from going alone, so late at night, to this region of silence and sad thoughts, and her fancy might have imbodied the shadows that flitted over the little mounds of earth; but she was now so engrossed by one absorbing, anxious expectation, that she scarcely thought of the place where it was to be attained, and she pressed on as if she were passing over common clods. Once, indeed, she paused, as the moon shot forth a bright ray, stooped down before a little {250} hillock, pressed her brow to the green turf, and then raising her eyes to Heaven, and clasping her hands, she exclaimed, “O, my mother! if ever thy presence is permitted to me, be with me now!” After this solemn adjuration she again rose to her feet, and looked anxiously before her for some expected object. “But I cannot know,” she said, “till I have passed the thicket of evergreens; that was the appointed spot.”

She passed the thicket, and at that moment the intensity of her feelings spread a mist before her eyes. She faltered, and leaned on one of the gravestones for support: and there we must leave her for the present, to the secrecy she sought.