CHAPTER IV.

But not to understand a treasure's worth Till time has stolen away the slighted good, Is cause of half the poverty we feel, And makes the world the wilderness it is.

Cowper.

After her conversation with the doctor, Susan applied herself more diligently than ever to her knitting, and succeeded in acquiring such dexterity, that she nearly equalled her mistress. She took every opportunity of walking in the fields, for she thought she should like to see the beautiful face of nature as long as it was permitted her to do so. George found that all peevishness had disappeared; his kindnesses were received with gratitude, and any little omission on his part did not seem to be perceived. The days had become so much shorter that she could no longer take a walk with him each evening when he returned from work, but on Sundays they still wandered through the fields together. He one day remarked how long the oaks had kept their leaves this year.

"I can see that the woods look thick," she replied; "but I cannot well distinguish their colour. However, I am glad the leaves last late this autumn, for I shall never see them again; before spring I shall be quite dark, George. I shall be very sorry not to see the young lambs: I used to like to watch them skip about upon the head-lands, when the sun shone out on a spring morning; and I shall be sorry not to see the primroses in the dell by Fairmead Shaw. O dear! I shall tie up no more bunches of violets in Oldash Lane, where the banks are always so blue with them! I did not know at the time how much I enjoyed all those sights. And the pretty young shoots of the sallow, that we used to gather for Palm Sunday! Oh! we are all giddy thoughtless creatures, George, and do not half value the common blessings of life while we have them. I think sometimes of such things till my heart seems ready to burst; and then I remember poor father, how patient and contented he is; and I know how mother bears all her pains, and I remember that I have not much pain to bear; for I do not suffer now, except, to be sure, in my poor mind. I feel a great deal sometimes, George,--more than I like to talk about; and I think a great deal; and the time must come when you must think too. I know this is not the way for a young man to wear away his life; I know it all, and I do not mean to hold you to your word; only, as long as I can walk about and see the old places at all, I should like to walk with you, and see them with you."

"Oh, Susan! you go near to break my heart when you talk so beautifully. But you know I wanted long ago that we should be married, and you know I am ready to work night and day to keep you; and there will be Master Mumford's house at liberty by the spring. I am ready and willing to do my best for you."

"No, George, it won't do; such a poor helpless creature as I shall be by the spring must not think of taking care of a family. Hark how that robin is singing! There is one comfort: I shall be able to hear the birds sing, and I shall know when the spring comes by hearing them; and listening to their songs will put me in mind of all the pretty sights there are in spring time. I will tell you what is worst of all, George,--that I shall never be able to see the faces of those I love again. I cannot justly discern the favour of any one now; that is what I miss most. I cannot be sure now when you look at me, except by a kind of guess. Oh, George! sometimes I think how vain and foolish I used to be, and how much I prided myself upon looking pretty of a Sunday, when I thought I should meet you, and it all seems to me now to have been such vanity; and I am sorry now I did not read my Bible more when I could read. It would be a comfort to me to have more texts by heart, to repeat to myself when I feel as sad as I often do."

They walked on in silence till they passed under a large holly which grew on the steep bank of the road. "Is not that the old holly from which we used to gather the branches to stick in our windows at Christmas? I think it looks black against the sky."

"Yes, dear Susan, that is the very holly."

"Are there many red berries upon it this autumn?"

"Yes, there's quite a sight of berries."

"I wish I could see them!--but that can't be. As I was saying George, about the Bible,--be sure you read a chapter every Sunday: it will do you good: as poor Mr. Sandford used to say, the Bible is the poor man's best friend. Poor Mr. Sandford! I am sorry he is so bad. It would have been a good thing for me if he had been able to go about as usual, and to talk to me, and give me good advice. Perhaps I should never have been so pettish as I was for a little while; but I have got over that now. He will be very much missed in the parish when he is gone; but he is a great age, and we all must go when our time comes. The place won't seem like itself when he is in his grave, and 'Squire Mowbray in foreign parts; for they say he is not coming back, but is going somewhere for Miss Fanny's health, and to finish the young ladies' education, now Miss Alice is married. Poor Miss Alice! To be sure, how well I remember her wedding! and truly enough did I say I should never spend so happy a day again; but I did not think so when I said it. I thought I should spend many and many much happier days when I was married to you, George, for all I was so flighty that evening." And Susan smiled, and then sighed to think how light-hearted she had been.

"Ah, that was a happy day!" said George; and he shook his head sorrowfully, as he led poor Susan home to her father's cottage.

Each succeeding week saw Susan's blindness gradually increase; and as her sight became more and more dim, she became more than ever gentle and uncomplaining. Of all the visitations with which human nature is afflicted, none assuredly has such a tendency to calm, to purify, and to refine the heart, as blindness. The absence of all external objects to distract the attention, forces the soul to look back into itself, to subdue its passions, to control its emotions, to chasten all its feelings. It is seldom that the countenance of a blind person does not bear the stamp of a meek and resigned spirit within.

Old Mr. Sandford died, and was replaced by a worthy common-place clergyman, who did the duty in a respectable common-place manner; who attended the schools, and visited the poor people, and was sorry for the blind young woman; but, not having known her previously, took no particular interest in her case. Susan and her father lamented the death of Mr. Sandford. To them the loss of the voice to which they had been accustomed was a deprivation far greater than to others, for to them a voice was everything.

Susan was one day seated at her usual hour with her knitting by Nelly's side, when Mr. and Mrs. Otley paid the old woman a visit.

"Ah!" said Nelly, "I warrant me, they are coming for some job of their own. It's seldom any one opens my door to keep me company, or to cheer my lonesome days: that's the way of the world,--every one for himself." Then addressing Mrs. Otley as she entered: "Well, ma'am, and what queer new-fangled piece of work do you want to set me about now?"

"I have brought you a new pattern, Nelly," replied the good-humoured Mrs. Otley; "these knit boas are quite the fashion at Turnholme; and I thought if you got some done before they grow common, it would be such a good thing for you!"

"And can you tell me how I am to set about making such an out-of-the-way thing as this?" said Nelly, as she held up the boa with a disdainful air.

"No, I cannot tell you how to do it; but you are so clever at such matters, I thought you would know directly."

"Perhaps I may find out, as there are few stitches I do not know," replied Nelly, her temper a little soothed through the medium of her vanity; "but when I have made them, I do not see who there is to buy them, now Mrs. Mowbray and her family are gone."

"Oh! in the first place, I will take one; and then Miss Mincing will be glad to take any number, if you let her have them a trifle under the usual price."

Nelly nodded, with a half-pleased, half-cunning air, as if she had proved right, and Mrs. Otley had her own ends to answer in her apparent good-nature. "And, perhaps," continued Mrs. Otley, "the Mowbrays may be at home before next winter."

"No," said Nelly, "not a bit of it. That's all a pretence about the young ladies' education. They have had some losses out, there away, in them sugar-mines, and they won't be at home these two years," replied Nelly, with the dogmatical air of one whose superior information could not be doubted.

"That's sad news, Mrs. Nelly," interposed Mr. Otley; "'tis a wonder Mr. Williams did not say a word about it yesterday, when I called, about stocking up that hedge."

"The news only came this morning; but I believe you will find it's true enough; though people think an old woman can know nothing."

"I'm loth to credit such bad news about such good people," answered Mr. Otley.

"They may be good, for aught I know to the contrary; but I am sure it is little enough I have profited by their goodness."

"Oh, Nelly!" exclaimed Susan, "did not they keep you always in employment; and if you had nothing else to do, did they not bid you always be knitting stockings for them, which they afterwards gave to the poor?"

"And much good that did me! I was none the warmer. They paid me for my work, sure enough; and what thanks do I owe them for that? It would be a pretty thing indeed, if gentlefolks ordered goods of poor people, and then cheated them out of their money."

"Oh, Nelly!" cried Susan, and she longed to add, "how ungrateful!" but she remembered she was old and sick, and she restrained herself.

"I always thought it would come to this. I always thought the 'squire would run himself into debt with the warm house he kept, and his dances on the green to giddy boys and girls;"--(Susan sighed)--"and then the grand company that visited at the Park! I am sure it has kept me awake many a night to hear the carriages rolling by after a dinner-party. It won't do to burn the candle at both ends. I have always said so; but nobody minds me."

"I am sure, Nelly," interposed Mrs. Otley, "Mr. Mowbray saw no more company than was proper and becoming for a gentleman of his birth and connexions: and it would have been a sin and a shame if he had let his daughters mope at home without allowing them to see a little of the world; and as for his losses in his West India property, he could not foresee that his crop of sugar-canes would fail, or that a hurricane would ruin his plantations."

"I know nothing about sugar-canes, nor hurricanes, not I; but I know that if they are things that pay one year, and don't pay the next, you should reckon accordingly, and not live as if sugar-mines paid every year as regular as sheep or corn."

"Not sugar-mines, Nelly. Sugar grows in plantations."

"Sugar-mines, or salt-mines, it is all one to me; that's no business of mine," replied Nelly doggedly, "and it makes little difference to me. If them losses out, there away, hinder the 'squire's family from coming home, and I have no regular sale for my stockings, it matters little what keeps them in foreign parts."

"Well, Mrs. Nelly," said Mr. Otley, "you are not the only person who will miss Mr. and Mrs. Mowbray. All who are willing to work will wish for the 'squire back again, and all who are sick or sorry, will miss Mrs. Mowbray's kind words, and kind deeds; and I am sure I shall miss those sweet young ladies, with their smiling faces, and their affable manners, running about my yard, and playing with the dogs, and the cats, and the calves, and all the dumb animals."

"And I am sure I shall miss Mr. Mowbray's elegant manners and agreeable conversation, though I own it struck me there was something rather high about Mrs. Mowbray's ways, though she was such a dowdy in her dress. Well, Nelly, you do not seem to like the idea of knitting boas, so I will take away the pattern."

"And if I don't get employment from Miss Mincing, who am I to look to now?--but if you are against leaving it with me for a day or two, why I don't wish to be beholden to anybody."

"I borrowed it on purpose from Mrs. Knotaway, and if you succeed in making them, I shall be very glad to buy one," added Mrs. Otley, as she took her leave.

Almost before the door was closed, "There," said Nelly, "I told you how it was. She thinks she can get her flaunting boa a trifle cheaper than if she bought it at Miss Mincing's. I know her well enough. People think I can't see through them, because I am old and helpless; but I have not lost my senses."

"Indeed, Nelly," said Susan, "Mrs. Otley ordered one, out of good-nature."

"And do you think, if my work was dearer than the shop-price, she would think so much of being good-natured?"

"Oh, Nelly! we should not be looking out for bad motives to kind actions. It will be a great advantage to you to find a market for your goods at Miss Mincing's, and I am sure Mrs. Otley meant to do you a service; and if it had not been for your good, Mr. Otley would never have let her propose it."

"Mr. Otley, indeed!--He just lets his flighty wife take her own way."

"He is very kind; but my cousin, Sophy Foster, who lived with them half-a-year, says he can be firm enough when there is need for it, and that he rules in all great things, though he does not like to be jarring about trifles."

"I don't know how it is, Susan, you are always contradicting one. You always have something to say in defence of everybody. It is a very disagreeable trick in a young woman to be contradicting her elders."

The spring had now stolen on; Master Mumford's house was free; and Susan thought it her duty to tell George that she released him from his engagement. She was quite blind. No hope was held out to her of recovery. Her becoming the wife of a poor man, the mother of a poor man's children, was absolutely out of the question. She took the opportunity one day, when her father and mother were both present, to say to him, "The time is come, George, when I must give you up. You have been very good to me, and I shall feel your goodness as long as I live; but I cannot make you such a wife as a poor man ought to have: and now, George, here, before my father and mother, I give you back your word. The house next door is free, and you must give the 'squire's steward your answer; and so you had better go to Mr. Williams and give it up at once. I can never live there with you; and if--if you should--if you should marry another girl, George," she continued resolutely, though with a choking voice, "I could not bear to have her live there--no more could you, I am sure you could not; so you had better go to the 'squire's steward and tell him how it is!" She stopped, exhausted with the effort she had made.

George stood by, grieved, distressed, uncertain how to act, or what to say. He loved Susan dearly, as dearly as ever; but it was true, she could not take care of a poor man's house. He was but a labourer; it was impossible he should earn enough to support her, and a person to do for her and the family they might have. It would be bringing her into a state of hopeless poverty and distress. He had no arguments to adduce, and yet he could not bear to break off his engagement. "What is to be done, dame?" at length he said, with the tears in his eyes. "I love your Susan, there, as dearly as ever I did, and I can't bear the thoughts of giving her up; and yet I have nothing to say against the reasons she has been bringing up against me. I am fairly puzzled what to do," he continued, rubbing his forehead. "I would not mind, if I thought I could keep her creditably; but if she and her children were to be brought to want, and I not able to earn a decent maintenance for them, why, I do think that would be worst of all."

"There is nothing to be done, dear George, but what I tell you. We must break off with one another, and you must try to forget by-gone days: that will soon be easy enough for you. As for me, I do not see there is any need for me to try to forget, for I may as well think over everything that is pleasant; and it will always be a pleasure to me to think how kind you have been to me, and how true you have been to me!" and she held out her hand in the direction where he stood, moving it slowly towards him as blind people do. He took her hand, he grasped it firmly; he pressed it between his own hard palms, occasionally patting it, in silence for some minutes, till at length he let it fall, and dropping his head upon the deal dresser, he burst into an agony of uncontrollable sobs.