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THE TWINS;

A DOMESTIC NOVEL.


BY

MARTIN FARQUHAR TUPPER, A.M., F.R.S.

AUTHOR OF

PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY.


HARTFORD:

PUBLISHED BY SILAS ANDRUS & SON

1851.

THE TWINS.




CHAPTER I.

PLACE: TIME: CIRCUMSTANCE.


BURLEIGH-SINGLETON is a pleasant little watering-place on the southern
coast of England, entirely suitable for those who have small incomes and
good consciences. The latter, to residents especially, are at least as
indispensable as the former: seeing that, however just the reputation of
their growing little town for superior cheapness in matters of meat and
drink, its character in things regarding men and manners is quite as
undeniable for preëminent dullness.

Not but that it has its varieties of scene, and more or less of
circumstances too: there are, on one flank, the breezy Heights, with
flag-staff and panorama; on the other, broad and level water-meadows,
skirted by the dark-flowing Mullet, running to the sea between its
tortuous banks: for neighbourhood, Pacton Park is one great
attraction--the pretty market-town of Eyemouth another--the everlasting,
never-tiring sea a third; and, at high-summer, when the Devonshire lanes
are not knee-deep in mire, the nevertheless immeasurably filthy, though
picturesque, mud-built village of Oxton.

Then again (and really as I enumerate these multitudinous advantages, I
begin to relent for having called it dull), you may pick up curious
agate pebbles on the beach, as well as corallines and scarce sea-weeds,
good for gumming on front-parlour windows; you may fish _for_ whitings
in the bay, and occasionally catch them; you may wade in huge caoutchouc
boots among the muddy shallows of the Mullet, and shoot _at_ cormorants
and curlews; you may walk to satiety between high-banked and rather
dirty cross-roads; and, if you will scramble up the hedge-row, may get
now and then peeps of undulated country landscape.

Moreover, you have free liberty to drop in any where to
"tiffin"--Burleigh being very Indianized, and a guest always welcome;
indeed, so Indianized is it, so populous in jaundiced cheek and ailing
livers, that you may openly assert, without fear of being misunderstood
(if you wish to vary your common phrase of loyalty), that Victoria sits
upon the "musnud" of Great Britain; you may order curry in the smallest
pot-house, and still be sure to get the rice well-cooked; you may call
your house-maid "ayah," without risk of warning for impertinence; you
may vent your wrath against indolent waiters in eloquence of "jaa,
soostee;" and, finally, you may go to the library, and besides the
advantage of the day-before-yesterday's Times, you may behold in bilious
presence an affable, but authoritative, old gentleman, who introduces
himself, "Sir, you see in me the hero of Puttymuddyfudgepoor."

You may even now see such an one, I say, and hear him too, if you will
but go to Burleigh; seeing he has by this time over-lived the year or so
whereof our tale discourses. He has, by dint of service, attained to the
dignity of General H.E.I.C.S., and--which he was still longer coming
to--the wisdom of being a communicative creature; though possibly, by a
natural rëaction, at present he carries anti-secresy a little too far,
and verges on the gossiping extreme. But, at the time to which we must
look back to commence this right-instructive story, General Tracy was
still drinking "Hodgson's Pale" in India, was so taciturn as to be
considered almost dumb, and had not yet lifted up his yellow visage upon
Albion's white cliffs, nor taken up head-quarters in his final rest of
Burleigh-Singleton.

Nevertheless, with reference to quartering at Burleigh, a certain
long-neglected wife of his, Mrs. Tracy, had; and that for the period of
at least the twenty-one years preceding: how and wherefore I proceed to
tell.

A common case and common fate was that of Mrs. Tracy. She had married,
both early and hastily, a gallant lieutenant, John George Julian Tracy,
to wit, the military germ of our future general; their courtship and
acquaintance previous to matrimony extended over the not inconsiderable
space of three whole weeks--commencing with a country ball; and after
marriage, honey-moon inclusive, they lived the life of cooing doves for
three whole months.

And now came the furlough's end: Mr. Tracy, in his then habitual reserve
(a quiet man was he), had concealed its existence altogether: and, for
aught Jane knew, the hearty invalid was to remain at home for ever: but
months soon slip away; and so it came to pass, that on a certain next
Wednesday he must be on his way back to the Presidency of Madras,
and--if she will not follow him--he must leave her.

However, there was a certain old relative, one Mrs. Green, a childless
widow--rich, capricious, and infirm--whom Jane Tracy did not wish to
lose sight of: her money was well worth both watching and waiting for;
and the captain, whom a lucky chance had now lifted out of the
lieutenancy, was easily persuaded to forego the pleasure of his wife's
company till the somewhat indefinite period of her old aunt's death.

How far sundry discoveries made in the unknown regions of each other's
temper reconciled him to this retrograding bachelorship, and her to her
widowhood-bewitched, I will not undertake to say: but I will hazard the
remark, anti-poor-law though it seemeth, that the separation of man and
wife, however convenient, lucrative, or even mutually pleasant, is a
dereliction of duty, which always deserves, and generally meets, its
proper and discriminative punishment. Had the young wife faithfully
performed her Maker's bidding, and left all other ties unstrung to
cleave unto her lord; had she considered a husband's true affections
before all other wealth, and resolved to share his dangers, to solace
his cares, to be his blessing through life, and his partner even unto
death, rather than selfishly to seek her own comfort, and consult her
own interest--the tale of crime and sadness, which it is my lot to tell,
would never have had truth for its foundation.

Ill-matched for happiness though they were, however well-matched as to
mutual merit, the common man of pleasure and the frivolous woman of
fashion, still the wisest way to fuse their minds to union, the
likeliest receipt for moral good and social comfort, would have been
this course of foreign scenes, of new faces, sprinkled with a seasoning
of adventure, hardship, danger, in a distant land. Gradually would they
have learned to bear and forbear; the petty quarrel would have been
forgotten in the frequent kindness; the rougher edges of temper and
opinion would insensibly have smoothed away; new circumstances would
have brought out better feelings under happier skies; old acquaintances,
false friends forgotten, would have neutralized old feuds: and, by
long-living together, though it were perhaps amid various worries and
many cares, they might still have come to a good old age with more than
average happiness, and more than the common run of love. Patience in
dutiful enduring brings a sure reward: and marriage, however irksome a
constraint to the foolish and the gay, is still so wise an ordinance,
that the most ill-assorted couple imaginable will unconsciously grow
happy, if they only remain true to one another, and will learn the
wisdom always to hope and often to forgive.

The Tracys, however, overlooked all this, and mutual friends (those
invariable foes to all that is generous and unworldly) smiled upon the
prudence of their temporary separation. The captain was to come home
again on furlough in five years at furthest, even if the aunt held out
so long; and this availed to keep his wife in the rear-guard; therefore,
Mrs. Tracy wiped her eyes, bade adieu to her retreating lord in Plymouth
Sound, and determined to abide, with other expectant dames and Asiatic
invalided heroes, at Burleigh-Singleton, until she might go to him, or
he return to her: for pleasant little Burleigh, besides its contiguity
to arriving Indiamen, was advantageous as being the dwelling-place of
aforesaid Mrs. Green;--that wealthy, widowed aunt, devoutly wished in
heaven: and the considerate old soul had offered her designing niece a
home with her till Tracy could come back.

During the first year of absence, ship-letters and India-letters arrived
duteously in consecutive succession: but somehow or other, the regular
post, in no long time afterwards, became unfaithful to its trust; and if
Mrs. Jane heard quarterly, which at any rate she did through the agent,
when he remitted her allowance, she consoled herself as to the captain's
well-being: in due course of things, even this became irregular; he was
far up the country, hunting, fighting, surveying, and what not; and no
wonder that letters, if written at all, which I rather doubt, got lost.
Then there came a long period of positive and protracted silence--months
of it--years of it; barring that her checks for cash were honoured still
at Hancock's, though they could tell her nothing of her lord; so that
Mrs. Tracy was at length seriously recommended by her friends to become
a widow; she tried on the cap, and looked into many mirrors; but, after
long inspection, decided upon still remaining a wife, because the weeds
were so clearly unbecoming. Habit, meanwhile, and that still-existing
old aunt, who seemed resolved to live to a hundred, kept her as before
at Burleigh: and, seeing that a few months after the captain's departure
she had presented the world, not to say her truant lord, with twins, she
had always found something to do in the way of, what she considered,
education, and other juvenile amusement: that is to say, when the
gayeties of a circle of fifteen miles in radius left her any time to
spare in such a process. The twins--a brace of boys--were born and bred
at Burleigh, and had attained severally to twenty years of age, just
before their father came home again as brevet-major-general. But both
they, and that arrival, deserve special detail, each in its own chapter.




CHAPTER II.

THE HEROES.


MRS. TRACY'S sons were as unlike each other as it is well possible for
two human beings to be, both in person and character. Julian, whose
forward and bold spirit gained him from the very cradle every
prerogative of eldership (and he did struggle first into life, too, so
he was the first-born), had grown to be a swarthy, strong, big-boned
man, of the Roman-nosed, or, more physiognomically, the Jewish cast of
countenance; with melo-dramatic elf-locks, large whiskers, and
ungovernable passions; loud, fierce, impetuous; cunning, too, for all
his overbearing clamour; and an embodied personification of those choice
essentials to criminal happiness--a hard heart and a good digestion.
Charles, on the contrary (or, as logicians would say, on the
contradictory), was fair-haired, blue-eyed, of Grecian features; slim,
though well enough for inches, and had hitherto (as the commonalty have
it) "enjoyed" weak health: he was gentle and affectionate in heart, pure
and religious in mind, studious and unobtrusive in habits. It was a
wonder to see the strange diversity between those own twin-brothers,
born within the same hour, and, it is superfluous to add, of the same
parents; brought up in all outward things alike, and who had shared
equally in all that might be called advantage or disadvantage, of
circumstance or education.

Certain is it that minds are different at birth, and require as
different a treatment as Iceland moss from cactuses, or bull-dogs from
bull-finches: certain is it, too, that Julian, early submitted and
resolutely broken in, would have made as great a man, as Charles,
naturally meek, did make a good one; but for the matter of educating her
boys, poor Mrs. Tracy had no more notion of the feat, than of squaring
the circle, or determining the longitude. She kept them both at home,
till the peevish aunt could suffer Julian's noise no longer: the house
was a Pandemonium, and the giant grown too big for that castle of
Otranto; so he must go at any rate; and (as no difference in the
treatment of different characters ever occurred to any body) of course
Charles must go along with him. Away they went to an expensive school,
which Julian's insubordination on the instant could not brook--and,
accordingly, he ran away; without doubt, Charles must be taken away too.
Another school was tried, Julian got expelled this time; and Charles,
in spite of prizes, must, on system, be removed with him: so forth, with
like wisdom, all through the years of adolescence and instruction, those
ill-matched brothers were driven as a pair. Then again, for fashion's
sake, and Aunt Green's whims, the circumspective mother, notwithstanding
all her inconsistencies, gave each of them prettily bound hand-books of
devotion; which the one used upon his knees, and the other lit cigars
withal; both extremes having exceeded her intention: and she proved
similarly overreached when she persisted in treating both exactly alike,
as to liberal allowances, and liberty of will; the result being, that
one of her sons "foolishly" spent his money in a multitude of charitable
hobbies; and that the other was constantly supplied with means for (the
mother was sorry to say it, vulgar) dissipation. By consequence, Charles
did more good, and Julian more evil, than I have time to stop and tell
off.

If any thing in this life must be personal, peculiar, and specific, it
is education: we take upon ourselves to speak thus dogmatically, not of
mere school-teaching only, _musa_, _musæ_, and so forth; nor yet of
lectures, on relative qualities of carbon and nitrogen in vegetables;
no, nor even of schemes of theology, or codes of morals; but we do speak
of the daily and hourly reining-in, or letting-out, of discouragement in
one appetite, and encouragement in another; of habitual formation of
characters in their diversity; and of shaping their bear's-cub, or that
child-angel, the natural human mind, to its destined ends; that it may
turn out, for good, according to its several natures, to be either the
strong-armed, bold-eyed, rough-hewer of God's grand designs, or the
delicate-fingered polisher of His rarest sculptures. Julian,
well-trained, might have grown to be a Luther; and many a gentle soul
like Charles, has turned out a coxcomb and a sensualist.

The boys were born, as I have said, in the regulation order of things, a
few months after Captain Tracy sailed away for India some full score of
years, and more, from this present hour, when we have seen him seated as
a general in the library at Burleigh; and, until the last year, they had
never seen their father--scarcely ever heard of him.

The incidents of their lives had been few and common-place: it would be
easy, but wearisome, to specify the orchards and the bee-hives which
Julian had robbed as a school-boy; the rebellions he had headed; the
monkey tricks he had played upon old fish-women; and the cruel havoc he
made of cats, rats, and other poor tormented creatures, who had
ministered to his wanton and brutalizing joys. In like manner, wearily,
but easily, might I relate how Charles grew up the nurse's darling,
though little of his flaunting mother's; the curly-pated young
book-worm; the sympathizing, innoffensive, gentle heart, whose effort
still it was to countervail his brother's evil: how often, at the risk
of blows, had he interposed to save some drowning puppy: how often paid
the bribe for Julian's impunity, when mulcted for some damage done in
the way of broken windows, upset apple-stalls, and the like: how often
had he screened his bad twin-brother from the flagellatory consequences
of sheer idleness, by doing for him all his school-tasks: how often
striven to guide his insensate conscience to truth, and good, and
wisdom: how often, and how vainly!

And when the youths grew up, and their good and evil grew up with them,
it were possible to tell you a heart-rending tale of Julian's treachery
to more than one poor village beauty; and many a pleasing trait of
Charles's pure benevolence, and wise zeal to remedy his brother's
mischiefs. The one went about doing ill, and the other doing good:
Julian, on account of obligations, more truly than in spite of them,
hated Charles; and yet one great aim of all Charles's amiabilities
tended continually to Julian's good, and he strove to please him, too,
while he wished to bless him. The one had grown to manhood, full of
unrepented sins, and ripe for darker crime: the other had attained a
like age of what is somewhat satirically called discretion, having
amassed, with Solon of old, "knowledge day by day," having lived a life
of piety and purity, and blest with a cheerful disposition, that teemed
with happy thoughts.

They had, of course, in the progress of human life, been both laid upon
the bed of sickness, where, with similar contrast, the one lay muttering
discontent, and the other smiling patiently: they had both been in
dangers by land and by sea, where Julian, though not a little lacking to
himself at the moment of peril, was still loudly minacious till it came
too near; while Charles, with all his caution, was more actually
courageous, and in spite of all his gentleness, stood against the worst
undaunted: they had both, with opposite motives and dissimilar modes of
life, passed through various vicissitudes of feeling, scene, society;
and the influence of circumstance on their different characters,
heightened or diminished, bettered or depraved, by the good or evil
principle in each, had produced their different and probable results.

Thus, strangely dissimilar, the twin-brothers together stand before us:
Julian the strong impersonation of the animal man, as Charles of the
intellectual; Julian, matter; Charles, spirit; Julian, the creature of
this world, tending to a lower and a worse: Charles, though in the
world, not of the world, and reaching to a higher and a better.

Mrs. Tracy, the mother of this various progeny, had been somewhat of a
beauty in her day, albeit much too large and masculine for the taste of
ordinary mortals; and though now very considerably past forty, the vain
vast female was still ambitious of compliment, and greedy of admiration.
That Julian should be such a woman's favourite will surprise none: she
had, she could have, no sympathies with mild and thoughtful Charles; but
rather dreaded to set her flaunting folly in the light of his wise
glance, and sought to hide her humbled vanity from his pure and keen
perceptions. His very presence was a tacit rebuke to her social
dissipation, and she could not endure the mild radiance of his virtues.
He never fawned and flattered her, as Julian would; but had even
suffered filial presumption (it could not be affection--O dear, no!) to
go so far as gently to expostulate at what he fancied wrong; he never
gave her reason to contrast, with happy self-complacence, her own soul's
state with Charles's, however she could with Julian's: and then, too,
she would indulgently allow her foolish mind--a woman's, though a
parent's--to admire that tall, black, bandit-looking son, above the
slight build, the delicate features, and almost feminine elegance of his
brother: she found Julian always ready to countenance and pamper her
gayest wishes, and was glad to make him her escort every where--at
balls, and fêtes, and races, and archery parties; while as to Charles,
he would be the stay-at-home, the milk-sop, the learned pundit, the
pious prayer-monger, any thing but the ladies' man. Yes: it is little
wonder that Mrs. Tracy's heart clave to Julian, the masculine image of
herself; while it barely tolerated Charles, who was a rarefied and
idealized likeness of the absent and forgotten Tracy.

But the mother--and there are many silly mothers, almost as many as
silly men and silly maids--in her admiration of the outward form of
manliness, overlooked the true strength, and chivalry, and nobleness of
mind which shone supreme in Charles. How would Julian have acted in such
a case as this?--a sheep had wandered down the cliff's face to a narrow
ledge of rock, whence it could not come back again, for there was no
room to turn: Julian would have pelted it, and set his bull-dog at it,
and rejoiced to have seen the poor animal's frantic leaps from shingly
shelf to shelf, till it would be dashed to pieces. But how did Charles
act? With the utmost courage, and caution, and presence of mind, he
crept down, and, at the risk of his life, dragged the bleating,
unreluctant creature up again; it really seemed as if the ungrateful
poor dumb brute recognised its humane friend, and suffered him to rescue
it without a struggle or a motion that might have endangered both.

Again: a burly costermonger was belabouring his donkey, and the wretched
beast fell beneath his cudgel: strange to say, Julian and Charles were
walking together that time; and the same sight affected each so
differently, that the one sided with the cruel man, and the other with
his suffering victim: Charles, in momentary indignation, rushed up to
the fellow, wrested the cudgel from his hand, and flung it over the
cliff; while Julian was so base, so cowardly, as to reward such generous
interference, by holding his weaker brother's arms, and inviting the
wrathful costermonger to expend the remainder of his phrensy on unlucky
Charles. Yes, and when at home Mrs. Tracy heard all this, she was silly
enough, wicked enough, to receive her truly noble son with ridicule, and
her other one, the child of her disgrace, with approval.

"It will teach you, Master Charles, not to meddle with common people and
their donkeys; and you may thank your brother Julian for giving you a
lesson how a gentleman should behave."

Poor Charles! but poorer Julian, and poorest Mrs. Tracy!

It would be easy, if need were, to enumerate multiplied examples tending
towards the same end--a large, masculine-featured mother's foolish
preference of the loud, bold, worldly animal, before the meek, kind,
noble, spiritual. And the results of all these many matters were, that
now, at twenty years of age, Charles found himself, as it were, alone in
a strange land, with many common friends indeed abroad, but at home no
nearer, dearer ties to string his heart's dank lyre withal; neither
mother nor brother, nor any other kind familiar face, to look upon his
gentleness in love, or to sympathize with his affections, unapprehended,
unappreciated: so--while Mrs. Tracy was the showy, gay, and vapid thing
she ever had been, and Julian the same impetuous mother's son which his
very nurse could say she knew him--Charles grew up a shy and silent
youth, necessarily reserved, for lack of some one to understand him;
necessarily chilled, for want of somebody to love him.




CHAPTER III.

THE ARRIVAL.


THE young men were thus situated as regards both the world and one
another, and Mrs. Tracy had almost entirely forgotten the fact, that she
possessed a piece of goods so supererogatory as her husband (a property
too which her children had never quite realized), when all on a sudden,
one ordinary morning, the postman's-knock brought to her breakfast-table
at Burleigh-Singleton the following epistle:

                     "British Channel, Thursday, March 11th, 1842.
                                  "The Sir William Elphinston, E.I.M.

"DEAR JANE: You will be surprised to find that you are to see me so
soon, I dare say, especially as it is now some years since you will have
heard from me. The reason is, I have been long in an out-of-the-way part
of India, where there is little communication with Europe, and so you
will excuse my not writing. We hope to find ourselves to-night in
Plymouth roads, where I shall get into a pilot-boat, and so shall see
you to-morrow. You may, therefore, now expect your affectionate husband,

                                      "J.G.J. TRACY, General H.E.I.C.S.

"P.S.1.--Remember me to our boy, or boys--which is it?

"P.S.2.--I bring with me the daughter of a friend in India, who is come
over for a year or two's polish at a first-rate school. Of course you
will be glad to receive her as our guest.

                                                          "J.G.J.T."

This loving letter was the most startling event that had ever attempted
to unnerve Mrs. Tracy; and she accordingly managed, for effect and
propriety's sake, to grow very faint upon the spot, whether for joy, or
sorrow, or fear of lost liberty, or hope of a restored lord, doth not
appear; she had so long been satisfied with receiving quarterly pay from
the India agents, that she forgot it was an evidence of her husband's
existence; and, lo! here he was returning a general, doubtlessly a
magnificent moustachioed individual, and she was to be Mrs. General! so
that when she came completely to herself, after that feint of a faint,
she was thinking of nothing but court-plumes, oriental pearls, and her
gallant Tracy's uniform.

The postscripts also had their influence: Charles, naturally
affectionate, and willing to love a hitherto unseen father, felt hurt,
as well he might, at the "boy, or boys;" while Julian, who ridiculed his
brother's sentimentality, was already fancying that the "daughter of a
friend" might be a pleasant addition to the dullness of
Burleigh-Singleton.

Preparations vast were made at once for the general's reception; from
attic to kitchen was sounded the tocsin of his coming. Julian was all
bustle and excitement, to his mother's joy and pride; while Charles
merited her wrath by too much of his habitual and paternal quietude,
particularly when he withdrew his forces altogether from the loud
domestic fray, by retreating up-stairs to cogitate and muse, perhaps to
make a calming prayer or two about all these matters of importance. As
for Mrs. Tracy herself, she was even now, within the first hour of that
news, busily engaged in collecting cosmetics, trinkets, blonde lace, and
other female finery, resolved to trick herself out like Jezebel, and win
her lord once more; whilst the pernicious old aunt, who still lived on,
notwithstanding all those twenty years of patience, as vivacious as
before, grumbled and scolded so much at this upsetting of her house,
that there was really some risk of her altering the will at last, and
cutting out Jane Tracy after all.

And the morrow morning came, as if it were no more than an ordinary
Friday, and with it came expectancy; and noon succeeded, and with it
spirits alternately elated and depressed; and evening drew in, with
heart-sickness and chagrin at hopes or prophecies deferred; and night,
and next morning, and still the general came not. So, much weeping at
that vexing disappointment, after so many pains to please, Mrs. Tracy
put aside her numerous aids and appliances, and lay slatternly a-bed, to
nurse a head-ache until noon; and all had well nigh forgotten the
probable arrival, when, to every body's dismay, a dusty chaise and four
suddenly rattled up the terrace, and stopped at our identical number
seven.

Then was there scuffling up, and getting down, and making preparation in
hot haste; and a stout gentleman with a gamboge face descended from the
chaise, exploding wrath like a bomb-shell, that so important an approach
had made such slight appearance of expectancy: it was disrespectful to
his rank, and he took care to prove he was somebody, by blowing up the
very innocent post-boys. This accomplished, he gallantly handed out
after him a pretty-looking miss in her teens. Poor Mrs. Tracy, _en
papillotes_, looked out at the casement like any one but Jezebel attired
for bewitching, and could have cried for vexation; in fact, she did,
and passed it off for feeling. Aunt Green, whom the general at first
lovingly saluted as his wife (for the poor man had entirely forgotten
the uxorial appearance), was all in a pucker for deafness, blindness,
and evident misapprehension of all things in general, though clearly
pleased, and flattered at her gallant nephew's salutation. Julian, with
what grace of manner he could muster, was already playing the agreeable
to that pretty ward, after having, to the general's great surprise,
introduced himself to him as his son; while Charles, who had rushed into
the room, warm-heartedly to fling himself into his father's arms, was
repelled on the spot for his affection: General Tracy, with a military
air, excused himself from the embrace, extending a finger to the unknown
gentleman, with somewhat of offended dignity.

At last, down came the wife: our general at once perceived himself
mistaken in the matter of Mrs. Green; and, coldly bowing to the
bedizened dame, acknowledged her pretensions with a courteous--

"Mrs. General Tracy, allow me to introduce to you Miss Emily Warren, the
daughter of a very particular friend of mine:--Miss Warren, Mrs. Tracy."

For other welcomings, mutual astonishment at each other's fat, some
little sorrowful talk of the twenty years ago, and some dull paternal
jest about this dozen feet of sons, made up the chilly meeting: and the
slender thread of sentimentals, which might possibly survive it, was
soon snapt by paying post-boys, orders after luggage, and devouring
tiffin.

The only persons who felt any thing at all, were Mrs. Tracy, vexed at
her dishabille, and mortified at so cool a reception of, what she hoped,
her still unsullied beauties; and Charles, poor fellow, who ran up to
his studious retreat, and soothed his grief, as best he might, with
philosophic fancies: it was so cold, so heartless, so unkind a greeting.
Romantic youth! how should the father have known him for a son?




CHAPTER IV.

THE GENERAL AND HIS WARD.


IT is surprising what a change twenty years of a tropical sun can make
in the human constitution. The captain went forth a good-looking,
good-tempered man, destitute neither of kind feelings nor masculine
beauty: the general returned bloated, bilious, irascible, entirely
selfish, and decidedly ill-favoured. Such affections as he ever had
seemed to have been left behind in India--that new world, around which
now all his associations and remembrances revolved; and the reserve
(clearly rëproduced in Charles), the habit of silence whereof we took
due notice in the spring-tide of his life, had now grown, perhaps from
some oppressive secret, into a settled, moody, continuous taciturnity,
which made his curious wife more vexed at him than ever; for,
notwithstanding all the news he must have had to tell her, the company
of John George Julian Tracy proved to his long-expectant Jane any thing
but cheering or instructive. His past life, and present feelings, to say
nothing of his future prospects, might all be but a blank, for any thing
the general seemed to care: brandy and tobacco, an easy chair, and an
ordnance map of India, with Emily beside him to talk about old times,
these were all for which he lived: and even the female curiosity of a
wife, duly authorized to ask questions, could extract from him
astonishingly little of his Indian experiences. As to his wealth,
indeed, Mrs. Tracy boldly made direct inquiry; for Julian set her on to
beg for a commission, and Charles also was anxious for a year or two at
college; but the general divulged not much: albeit he vouchsafed to both
his sons a liberally increased allowance. It was only when his wife,
piqued at such reserve, pettishly remarked,

"At any rate, sir, I may be permitted to hope, that Miss Warren's
friends are kind enough to pay her expenses;"

That the veteran, in high dudgeon at any imputation on his Indian
acquaintances, sternly answered,

"You need not be apprehensive, madam; Emily Warren is amply provided
for." Words which sank deep into the prudent mother's mind.

But we must not too long let dock-leaves hide a violet; it is high time,
and barely courteous now, to introduce that beautiful exotic, Emily
Warren. Her own history, as she will tell it to Charles hereafter, was
so obscure, that she knew little of it certainly herself, and could
barely gather probabilities from scattered fragments. At present, we
have only to survey results in a superficial manner: in their due
season, we will dig up all the roots.

No heroine can probably engage our interest or sympathy who possesses
the infirmity of ugliness: it is not in human nature to admire her, and
human nature is a thing very much to be consulted. Moreover, no one ever
yet saw an amiable personage, who was not so far pleasing, or, in other
parlance, so far pretty. I cannot help the common course of things; and
however hackneyed be the thought, however common-place the phrase, it is
true, nevertheless, that beauty, singular beauty, would be the first
idea of any rational creature, who caught but a glimpse of Emily Warren;
and I should account it little wonder if, upon a calmer gaze, that
beauty were found to have its deepest, clearest fountain in those large
dark eyes of heir's.

Aware as I may be, that "large dark eyes" are no novelty in tales like
this; and famous for rare originality as my pen (not to say genius)
would become, if an attempt were herein made to interest the world in a
pink-eyed heroine, still I prefer plodding on in the well-worn path of
pleasant beauty; and so long as Nature's bounty continues to supply so
well the world we live in with large dark eyes, and other feminine
perfections, our Emily, at any rate, remains in fashion; and if she has
many pretty peers, let us at least not peevishly complain of them. A
graceful shape is, luckily, almost the common prerogative of female
youthfulness; a dimpled smile, a cheerful, winning manner, regular
features, and a mass of luxuriant brown hair--these all heroines
have--and so has our's.

But no heroine ever had yet Emily Warren's eyes; not identically only,
which few can well deny; but similarly also, which the many must be good
enough to grant: and very few heroes, indeed, ever saw their equal;
though, if any hereabouts object, I will not be so cruel or unreasonable
as to hope they will admit it. At first, full of soft light, gentle and
alluring, they brighten up to blaze upon you lustrously, and fascinate
the gazer's dazzled glance: there are depths in them that tell of the
unfathomable soul, heights in them that speak of the spirit's
aspirations. It is gentleness and purity, no less than sensibility and
passion, that look forth in such strange power from those windows of the
mind: it is not the mere beautiful machine, fair form, and pleasing
colours, but the heaven-born light of tenderness and truth, streaming
through the lens, that takes the fond heart captive. Charles, for one,
could not help looking long and keenly into Emily Warren's eyes; they
magnetized him, so that he might not turn away from them: entranced him,
that he would not break their charm, had he been able: and then the long
tufted eyelashes droop so softly over those blazing suns--that I do not
in the least wonder at Charles's impolite, perhaps, but still natural
involuntary stare, and his mute abstracted admiration: the poor youth is
caught at once, a most willing captive--the moth has burnt its wings,
and flutters still happily around that pleasant warming radiance. How
his heart yearned for something to love, some being worthy of his own
most pure affections: and lo! these beauteous eyes, true witnesses of
this sweet mind, have filled him for ever and a day with love at first
sight.

But gentle Charles was not the only conquest: the fiery Julian, too,
acknowledged her supremacy, bowed his stubborn neck, and yoked himself
at once, another and more rugged captive, to the chariot of her charms.
It was Caliban, as well as Ferdinand, courting fair Miranda. In his
lower grade, he loved--fiercely, coarsely: and the same passion, which
filled his brother's heart with happiest aspirations, and pure unselfish
tenderness towards the beauteous stranger, burnt him up as an inward and
consuming fire: Charles sunned himself in heaven's genial beams, while
Julian was hot with the lava-current of his own bad heart's volcano.

It will save much trouble, and do away with no little useless mystery,
to declare, at the outset, which of these opposite twin-brothers our
dark-eyed Emily preferred. She was only seventeen in years; but an
Indian sky had ripened her to full maturity, both of form and feelings:
and having never had any one whom she cared to think upon, and let her
heart delight in, till Charles looked first upon her beauty wonderingly,
it is no marvel if she unconsciously reciprocated his young heart's
thought--before ever he had breathed it to himself. Julian's admiration
she entirely overlooked; she never thought him more than civil--barely
that, perhaps--however he might flatter himself: but her heart and eyes
were full of his fair contrast, the light seen brighter against
darkness; Charles all the dearer for a Julian. Intensely did she love
him, as only tropic blood can love; intently did she gaze on him, when
any while he could not see her face, as only those dark eyes could gaze:
and her mind, all too ignorant but greedy of instruction, no less than
her heart, rich in sympathies and covetous of love, went forth, and fed
deliciously on the intellectual brow, and delicate flushing cheek of her
noble-minded Charles. Not all in a day, nor a week, nor a month, did
their loves thus ripen together. Emily was a simple child of nature, who
had every thing to learn; she scarcely knew her Maker's name, till
Charles instructed her in God's great love: the stars were to her only
shining studs of gold, and the world one mighty plain, and men and women
soulless creatures of a day, and the wisdom of creation unconsidered,
and the book of natural knowledge close sealed up, till Charles set out
before his eager student the mysteries of earth and heaven. Oh, those
blessed hours of sweet teaching! when he led her quick delighted steps
up the many avenues of science to the central throne of God! Oh, those
happy moments, never to return, when her eyes in gentle thankfulness for
some new truth laid open to them, flashed upon her youthful Mentor, love
and intelligence, and pleased admiring wonder! Sweet spring-tide of
their loves, who scarcely knew they loved, yet thought of nothing but
each other; who walked hand in hand, as brother and sister, in the
flowery ways of mutual blessing, mutual dependence: alas, alas! how
brief a space can love, that guest from heaven, dwell on earth
unsullied!




CHAPTER V.

JEALOUSY.


FOR Julian soon perceived that Charles was no despicable rival. At
first, self-flattery, and the habitual contempt wherewith he regarded his
brother, blinded him to Emily's attachment: moreover, in the scenes of
gayety and the common social circle, she never gave him cause to complain
of undue preferences; readily she leant upon his arm, cheerfully
accompanied him in morning-visits, noon-day walks, and evening parties;
and if pale Charles (in addition to the more regular masters, dancing
and music, and other pieces of accomplishment) thought proper to bore
her with his books for sundry hours every day, Julian found no fault
with that;--the girl was getting more a woman of the world, and all
for him: she would like her play-time all the better for such schoolings,
and him to be the truant at her side.

But when, from ordinary civilities, the coarse loud lover proceeded to
particular attentions; when he affected to press her delicate hand, and
ventured to look what he called love into her eyes, and to breathe silly
nothings in her ear--he could deceive himself no longer, notwithstanding
all his vanity; as legibly as looks could write it, he read disgust
upon her face, and from that day forth she shunned him with undisguised
abhorrence. Poor innocent maid! she little knew the man's black mind,
who thus dared to reach up to the height of her affections; but she saw
enough of character in his swart scowling face, and loud assuming manners,
to make her dread his very presence, as a thunder-cloud across
her summer sky.

Then did the baffled Julian begin to look around him, and took notice
of her deepening love of Charles; nay, even purposely, she seemed now
to make a difference between them, as if to check presumption and
encourage merit. And he watched their stolen glances, how tremblingly
they met each other's gaze; and he would often-times roughly break in
upon their studies, to look on their confused disquietude with the pallid
frowns of envy: he would insult poor Charles before her, in hope to
humble him in her esteem; but mild and Christian patience made her
see him as a martyr: he would even cast rude slights on her whom he
professed to love, with the view of raising his brother's chastened wrath,
but was forced to quail and sneak away beneath her quick indignant
glance, ere her more philosophical lover had time to expostulate with
the cowardly savage.

Meanwhile, what were the parents about? The general had given out,
indeed, that he had brought Emily over for schooling; but he seemed so
fond of her (in fact, she was the only thing to prove he wore a heart),
that he never could resolve upon sending her away from, what she now
might well call, home. Often, in some strange dialect of Hindostan, did
they converse together, of old times and distant shores; none but Emily
might read him to sleep--none but Emily wake him in the morning with
a kiss--none but Emily dare approach him in his gouty torments--none
but Emily had any thing like intimate acquaintance with that moody
iron-hearted man.

As to his sons, or the two young men he might presume to be his sons, he
neither knew them, nor cared to know. Bare civilities, as between man
and man, constituted all which their intercourse amounted to: what were
those young fellows, stout or slim, to him? mere accidents of a
soldier's gallantries and of an ill-assorted marriage. He neither had,
nor wished to have, any sympathies with them: Julian might be as bad as
he pleased, and Charles as good, for any thing the general seemed to
heed: they could not dive with him into the past, and the sports of
Hindostan: they reminded him, simply, of his wife, for pleasures of
Memory; of the grave, for pleasures of Hope: he was older when he looked
at them: and they seemed to him only living witnesses of his folly as
lieutenant, in the choice of Mrs. Tracy. I will not take upon myself to
say, that he had any occasion to congratulate himself on the latter
reminiscence.

So he quickly acquiesced in Julian's wish for a commission, and
entirely approved of Charles's college schemes. After next September,
the funds should be forthcoming: not but that he was rich enough, and
to spare, any month in the year: but he would be vastly richer then,
from prize-money, or some such luck. It was more prudent to delay
until September.

With reference to Emily--no, no--I could see at once that General
Tracy never had any serious intention to part with Emily; but she had
all manner of masters at home, and soon made extraordinary progress.
As for the matter of his sons falling in love with her, attractive in all
beauty though she were, he never once had given it a thought: for, first,
he was too much a man of the world to believe in such ideal trash as
love: and next, he totally forgot that his "boy, or boys," had human
feelings. So, when his wife one day gave him a gentle and triumphant
hint of the state of affairs, it came upon him overwhelmingly, like an
avalanche: his yellow face turned flake-white, he trembled as he stood,
and really seemed to take so natural a probability to heart as the most
serious of evils.

"My son Julian in love with Emily! and if not he, at any rate Charles!
What the devil, madam, can you mean by this dreadful piece of
intelligence?--It's impossible, ma'am; nonsense! it can't be true; it
shan't, ma'am."

And the general, having issued his military mandates, wrapped himself
in secresy once more; satisfied that both of those troublesome sons
were to leave home after the next quarter, and the prize-money at
Hancock's.




CHAPTER VI.

THE CONFIDANTE.


BUT Mrs. Tracy had the best reason for believing her intelligence was
true, and she could see very little cause for regarding it as dreadful.
True, one son would have been enough for this wealthy Indian
heiress--but still it was no harm to have two strings to her bow. Julian
was her favourite, and should have the girl if she could manage it; but
if Emily Warren would not hear of such a husband, why Charles Tracy may
far better get her money than any body else.

That she possessed great wealth was evident: such jewellery, such
Trinchinopoli chains, such a blaze of diamonds _en suite_, such a
multitude of armlets, and circlets, and ear-rings, and other oriental
finery, had never shone on Devonshire before: at the Eyemouth ball, men
worshipped her, radiant in beauty, and gorgeously apparelled. Moreover,
money overflowed her purse, her work-box, and her jewel-case: Charles's
village school, and many other well-considered charities, rejoiced in
the streams of her munificence. The general had given her a banker's
book of signed blank checks, and she filled up sums at pleasure: such
unbounded confidence had he in her own prudence and her far-off father's
liberality. The few hints her husband deigned to give, encouraged Mrs.
Tracy to conclude, that she would be a catch for either of her sons;
and, as for the girl herself, she had clearly been brought up to order
about a multitude of servants, to command the use of splendid equipages,
and to spend money with unsparing hand.

Accordingly, one day when Julian was alone with his mother, their
conversation ran as follows:

"Well, Julian dear, and what do you think of Emily Warren?"

"Think, mother? why--that she's deuced pretty, and dresses like an
empress: but where did the general pick her up, eh?--who is she?"

"Why, as to who she is--I know no more than you; she is Emily Warren:
but as to the great question of what she is, I know that she is rolling
in riches, and would make one of my boys a very good wife."

"Oh, as to wife, mother, one isn't going to be fool enough to marry for
love now-a-days: things are easier managed hereabouts, than that: but
money makes it quite another thing. So, this pretty minx is rich, is
she?"

"A great heiress, I assure you, Julian."

"Bravo, bravo-o! but how to make the girl look sweet upon me, mother?
There's that white-livered fellow, Charles--"

"Never mind him, boy; do you suppose he would have the heart to make
love to such a splendid creature as Miss Warren: fy, Julian, for a faint
heart: Charles is well enough as a Sabbath-school teacher, but I hope he
will not bear away the palm of a ladye-love from my fine high-spirited
Julian." Poor Mrs. Tracy was as flighty and romantic at forty-five as
she had been at fifteen.

The fine high-spirited Julian answered not a word, but looked
excessively cross; for he knew full well that Charles's chance was to
his in the ratio of a million to nothing.

"What, boy," went on the prudent mother, "still silent! I am afraid
Emily's good looks have been thrown away upon you, and that your heart
has not found out how to love her."

"Love her, mother? Curses! would you drive me mad? I think and dream of
nothing but that girl: morning, noon, and night, her eyes persecute me:
go where I will, and do what I will, her image haunts me: d----n it,
mother' don't I love the girl?"

[Oh love, love! thou much-slandered monosyllable, how desperately do bad
men malign thee!]

"Hush, Julian; pray be more guarded in your language; I am glad to see
though that your heart is in the right place: suppose now that I aid
your suit a little? I dare say I could do a great deal for you, my son;
and nothing could be more delightful to your mother than to try and make
her Julian happy."

True, Mrs. Tracy; you were always theatrically given, and played the
coquette in youth; so in age the character of go-between befits you
still: dearly do you love to dabble in, what you are pleased to call,
"_une affaire du coeur_."

"Mother," after a pause, replied her hopeful progeny, "if the girl had
been only pretty, I shouldn't have asked any body's help; for marriage
was never to my liking, and folks may have their will of prouder
beauties than this Emily, without going to church for it; but money
makes it quite another matter: and I may as well have the benefit of
your assistance in this matter o' money, eh mother? matrimony, you know:
an heiress and a beauty may be worth the wedding-ring; besides, when my
commission comes, I can follow the good example that my parents set me,
you know; and, after a three months' honey-mooning, can turn bachelor
again for twenty years or so, as our governor-general did, and so leave
wifey at home, till she becomes a Mrs. General like you."

Now, strange to say, this heartless bit of villany was any thing but
unpleasing to the foolish, flattered heart of Mrs. Tracy; he was a chip
of the old block, no better than his father: so she thanked "dear
Julian" for his confidence, with admiration and emotion; and looking
upwards, after the fashion of a Covent Garden martyr, blessed him.




CHAPTER VII.

THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE, ETC.


"EMILY, my dear, take Julian's arm: here, Charles, come and change with
me; I should like a walk with you to Oxton, to see how your little
scholars get on." So spake the intriguing mother.

"Why, that is just what I was going to do with Charles," said Emily,
"and if Julian will excuse me--"

"Oh, never mind me, Miss Warren, pray; come along with me, will you,
mother?"

So they paired off in more well-matched couples (for Julian luckily took
huff), and went their different ways: with those went hatred, envy,
worldly scheming, and that lowest sort of love that ill deserves the
name; with these remain all things pure, affectionate, benevolent.

"Charles, dear," (they were just like brother and sister, innocent and
loving), "how kind it is of you to take me with you; if you only knew
how I dreaded Julian!"

"Why, Emmy? can he have offended you in any way?"

"Oh, Charles, he is so rude, and says such silly things, and--I am quite
afraid to be alone with him."

"What--what--what does he say to you, Emily?" hurriedly urged her
half-avowed lover.

"Oh, don't ask me, Charles--pray drop the subject;" and, as she blushed,
tears stood in her eyes.

Charles bit his lip and clenched his fist involuntarily; but an instant
word of prayer drove away the spirit of hatred, and set up love
triumphant in its place.

"My Emily--oh, what have I said? may I--may I call you my Emily?
dearest, dearest girl!" escaped his lips, and he trembled at his own
presumption. It was a presumptuous speech indeed; but it burst from the
well of his affections, and he could not help it.

Her answer was not in words, and yet his heart-strings thrilled beneath
the melody; for her eyes shed on him a blaze of love that made him
almost faint before them. In an instant, they understood, without a
word, the happy truth, that each one loved the other.

"Precious, precious Emily!" They were now far away from Burleigh, in the
fields; and he seized her hand, and covered it with kisses.

What more they said I was not by to hear, and if I had been would not
have divulged it. There are holy secrets of affection, which those who
can remember their first love--and first love is the only love worth
mentioning--may think of for themselves. Well, far better than my feeble
pencilling can picture, will they fill up this slight sketch. That walk
to Oxton, that visit to the village school, was full of generous
affections unrepressed, the out-pourings of two deep-welled hearts,
flowing forth in sympathetic ecstasy. The trees, and fields, and
cottages were bathed in heavenly light, and the lovers, happy in each
other's trust, called upon the all-seeing God to bless the best
affections of His children.

And what a change these mutual confessions made in both their minds!
Doubt was gone; they _were_ beloved; oh, richest treasure of joy! Fear
was gone; they dared declare their love; oh, purest river of all
sublunary pleasures! No longer pale, anxious, thoughtful, worn by the
corroding care of "Does she--does she love?"--Charles was, from that
moment, a buoyant, cheerful, exhilarated being--a new character; he put
on manliness, and fortitude, and somewhat of involuntary pride; whilst
Emily felt, that enriched by the affections of him whom she regarded as
her wisest, kindest earthly friend, by the acquisition of his love, who
had led her heart to higher good than this world at its best can give
her, she was elevated and ennobled from the simple Indian child, into
the loved and honoured Christian woman. They went on that important walk
to Oxton feeble, divided, unsatisfied in heart: they returned as two
united spirits, one in faith, one in hope, one in love; both heavenly
and earthly.

But the happy hour is past too soon; and, home again, they mixed once
more with those conflicting elements of hatred and contention.

"Emily," asked the general, in a very unusual stretch of curiosity,
"where have you been to with Charles Tracy? You look flushed, my dear;
what's the matter?"

Of course "nothing" was the matter: and the general was answered wisely,
for love was nothing in his average estimate of men and women.

"Charles, what can have come to you? I never saw you look so happy in my
life," was the mother's troublesome inquiry; "why, our staid youth
positively looks cheerful."

Charles's walk had refreshed him, taken away his head-ache, put him in
spirits, and all manner of glib reasons for rejoicing.

"You were right, Julian," whispered Mrs. Tracy, "and we'll soon put the
stopper on all this sort of thing."

So, then, the moment our guiltless pair of lovers had severally stolen
away to their own rooms, there to feast on well-remembered looks, and
words, and hopes--there to lay before that heavenly Friend, whom both
had learned to trust, all their present joys, as aforetime all their
cares--Mrs. Tracy looked significantly at Julian, and thus addressed her
ever stern-eyed lord:

"So, general, the old song's coming true to us, I find, as to other
folks, who once were young together:

  "'And when with envy Time, transported, seeks to rob us of our joys,
  You'll in your girls again be courted, and I'll go wooing in my boys.'"

So said or sung the flighty Mrs. Tracy. It was as simple and innocent a
quotation as could possibly be made; I suppose most couples, who ever
heard the stanza, and have grown-up children, have thought upon its dear
domestic beauty: but it strangely affected the irascible old general. He
fumed and frowned, and looked the picture of horror; then, with a fierce
oath at his wife and sons, he firmly said--

"Woman, hold your fool's tongue: begone, and send Emily to me this
minute: stop, Mr. Julian--no--run up for your brother Charles, and come
you all to me in the study. Instantly, sir! do as I bid you, without a
word."

Julian would gladly have fought it out with his imperative father; but,
nevertheless, it was a comfort to have to fetch pale Charles for a
jobation; so he went at once. And the three young people, two of them
trembling with affections overstrained, and the third indurated in
effrontery, stood before that stern old man.

"Emily, child,"--and he added something in Hindostanee, "have I been
kind to you--and do you owe me any love?"

"Dear, dear sir, how can you ask me that?" said the warm-affectioned
girl, falling on her knees in tears.

"Get up, sweet child, and hear me: you see those boys; as you love me,
and yourself, and happiness, and honour--dare not to think of either,
one moment, as your husband."

Emily fainted; Charles staggered to assist her, though he well-nigh
swooned himself; and Julian folded his arms with a resolute air, as
waiting to hear what next.

But the general disappointed him: he had said his say: and, as volatile
salts, a lady's maid, and all that sort of rëinvigoration, seemed
essential to Emily's recovery, he rang the bell forthwith: so the
pleasant family party broke up without another word.




CHAPTER VIII.

THE MYSTERY.


OUR lovers would not have been praiseworthy, perhaps not human, had they
not met in secret once and again. True, their regularly concerted
studies were forbidden, and they never now might openly walk out
unaccompanied: but love (who has not found this out?) is both daring and
ingenious; and notwithstanding all that Emily purposed about doing as
the general so strangely bade her, they had many happy meetings, rich
with many happy words: all the happier no doubt for their stolen
sweetness.

There was one great and engrossing subject which often had employed
their curiosity; who and what was Emily Warren? for the poor girl did
not know herself. All she could guess, she told Charles, as he zealously
cross-questioned her from time to time: and the result of his inquiries
would appear to be as follows:

Emily's earliest recollections were of great barbaric pomp; huge
elephants richly caparisoned, mighty fans of peacock's tails, lines of
matchlock men, tribes of jewelled servants, a gilded palace, with its
gardens and fountains: plenty of rare gems to play with, and a splendid
queenly woman, whom she called by the Hindoo name for mother. The
general, too, was there among her first associations, as the gallant
Captain Tracy, with his company of native troops.

Then an era happened in her life; a tearful leave-taking with that proud
princess, who scarcely would part with her for sorrow; but the captain
swore it should be so: and an old Scotch-woman, her nurse, she could
remember, who told her as a child, but whether religiously or not she
could not tell, "Darling, come to me when you wish to know who made
you;" and then Mrs. Mackie went and spoke to the princess, and soothed
her, that she let the child depart peacefully. Most of her gorgeous
jewellery dated from that earliest time of inexplicable oriental
splendour.

After those infantine seven years, the captain took her with him to his
station up the country, where she lived she knew not how long, in a
strong hill-fort, one Puttymuddyfudgepoor, where there was a great deal
of fighting, and besieging, and storming, and cannonading; but it ceased
at last, and the captain, who then soon successively became both major
and colonel, always kept her in his own quarters, making her his little
pet; and, after the fighting was all over, his brother-officers would
take her out hunting in their howdahs, and she had plenty of
palanquin-bearers, sepoys, and servants at command; and, what was more,
good nurse Mackie was her constant friend and attendant.

Time wore on, and many little incidents of Indian life occurred, which
varied every day indeed, but still left nothing consequential behind
them: there were tiger-hunts, and incursions of Scindian tribes, and
Pindarree chieftains taken captive, and wounded soldiers brought into
the hospital; and often had she and good nurse Mackie tended at the sick
bed-side. And the colonel had the jungle fever, and would not let her go
from his sight; so she caught the fever too, and through Heaven's mercy
was recovered. And the colonel was fonder of her now than ever, calling
her his darling little child, and was proud to display her early budding
beauty to his military friends--pleasant sort of gentlemen, who gave her
pretty presents.

Then she grew up into womanhood, and saw more than one fine uniform at
her feet, but she did not comprehend those kindnesses: and the general
(he was general now) got into great passions with them, and stormed, and
swore, and drove them all away. Nurse Mackie grew to be old, and
sometimes asked her, "Can you keep a secret, child?--no, no, I dare not
trust you yet: wait a wee, wait a wee, my bonnie, bonnie bairn."

And now speedily came the end. The general resolved on returning to his
own old shores: chiefly, as it seemed, to avoid the troublesome
pertinacity of sundry suitors, who sought of him the hand of Emily
Warren for, by this name she was beginning to be called: in her earliest
recollection she was Amina; then at the hill-fort, Emily--Emily--nothing
for years but Emily: and as she grew to womanhood, the general bade her
sign her name to notes, and leave her card at houses, as Emily Warren:
why, or by what right, she never thought of asking. But nurse Mackie had
hinted she might have had "a better name and a truer;" and therefore,
she herself had asked the general what this hint might mean; and he was
so angry that he discharged nurse Mackie at Madras, directly he arrived
there to take ship for England.

Then, just before embarking, poor nurse Mackie came to her secretly, and
said, "Child, I will trust you with a word; you are not what he thinks
you." And she cried a great deal, and longed to come to England; but
the general would not hear of it; so he pensioned her off, and left her
at Madras, giving somebody strict orders not to let her follow him.

Nevertheless, just as they were getting into the boat to cross the surf,
the affectionate old soul ran out upon the strand, and called to her
"Amy Stuart! Amy Stuart!" to the general's great amazement as clearly as
her own; and she held up a packet in her hand as they were pushing off,
and shouted after her, "Child--child! if you would have your rights,
remember Jeanie Mackie!"

After that, succeeded the monotony of a long sea voyage. The general at
first seemed vexed about Mrs. Mackie, and often wished that he had asked
her what she meant; however, his brow soon cleared, for he reflected
that a discarded servant always tells falsehoods, if only to make her
master mischief.

"The voyage over, Charles, with all its cards, quadrilles, doubling the
cape, crossing the line, and the wearisome routine of sky and sea, the
quarter-deck and cabin, we found ourselves at length in Plymouth Sound;
left the Indiaman to go up the channel; and I suppose the post-chaise
may be consigned to your imagination."




CHAPTER IX.

HOW TO CLEAR IT UP.


IN all this there was mystery enough for a dozen lovers to have crazed
their brains about. Emily might be a queen of the East, defrauded of
hereditary glories, and at any rate deserved such rank, if Charles was
to be judge; but what was more important, if the general had any reason
at all for his arbitrary mandate prohibiting their love, it was very
possible that reason was a false one.

Meantime, Charles had little now to live for, except his dear forbidden
Emily, any more than she for him. And to peace of mind in both, the
elucidation of that mystery which hung about her birth, grew more
needful day by day. At last, one summer evening, when they had managed a
quiet walk upon the sands under the Beacon cliff, Charles said abruptly,
after some moments of abstraction, "Dearest, I am resolved."

"Resolved, Charles! what about?" and she felt quite alarmed; for her
lover looked so stern, that she could not tell what was going to happen
next.

"I'll clear it up, that I will; I only wish I had the money."

"Why, Charles, what in the world are you dreaming about? you frighten
me, dearest; are you ill? don't look so serious, pray."

"Yes, Emily, I will; at once too. I'm off to Madras by next packet; or,
that is to say, would, if I could get my passage free."

"My noble Charles, if that were the only objection, I would get you all
the means; for the kind--kind general suffers me to have whatever sums I
choose to ask for. Only, Charles, indeed I cannot spare you; do not--do
not go away and leave me; there's Julian, too--don't leave me--and you
might never come back, and--and--" all the remainder was lost in
sobbing.

"No, my Emmy, we must not use the general's gold in doing what he might
not wish; it would be ungenerous. I will try to get somebody to lend me
what I want--say Mrs. Sainsbury, or the Tamworths. And as for leaving
you, my love, have no fears for me or for yourself; situated as we are,
I take it as a duty to go, and make you happier, setting you in rights,
whatever these may be; and for the rest, I leave you in His holy keeping
who can preserve you alike in body, as in soul, from all things that
would hurt you, and whose mercy will protect me in all perils, and bring
me back to you in safety. This is my trust, Emmy."

"Dear Charles, you are always wiser and better than I am: let it be so
then, my best of friends. Seek out good nurse Mackie, I can give you
many clues, hear what she has to say; and may the God of your own poor
fatherless Emily speed your holy mission! Yet there is one thing,
Charles; ought you not to ask your parents for their leave to go? You
are better skilled to judge than I can be, though."

"Emmy, whom have I to ask? my father? he cares not whither I go nor what
becomes of me; I hardly know him, and for twenty years of my short life
of twenty-one, scarcely believed in his existence; or should I ask my
mother? alas--love! I wish I could persuade myself that she would wish
me back again if I were gone; moreover, how can I respect her judgment,
or be guided by her counsel, whose constant aim has been to thwart my
feeble efforts after truth and wisdom, and to pamper all ill growths in
my unhappy brother Julian? No, Emily; I am a man now, and take my own
advice. If a parent forbade me, indeed, and reasonably, it would be fit
to acquiesce; but knowing, as I have sad cause to know, that none but
you, my love, will be sorry for my absence, as for your sake alone that
absence is designed, I need take counsel only of us who are here
present--your own sweet eyes, myself, and God who seeth us."

"True--most true, dear Charles; I knew that you judged rightly."

"Moreover, Emmy, secresy is needful for the due fulfilment of my
purpose." (Charles little thought how congenial to his nature was that
same secresy.) "None but you must know where I am, or whither I am gone.
For if there really is any mystery which the general would conceal from
us, be assured he both could and would frustrate all my efforts if he
knew of my design. The same ship that carried me out would convey an
emissary from him, and nurse Mackie never could be found by me. I must
go then secretly, and, for our peace sake, soon; how dear to me that
embassy will be, entirely undertaken in my darling Emmy's cause!"

"But--but, Charles, what if Julian, in your absence--"

"Hark, my own betrothed! while I am near you--and I say it not of
threat, but as in the sight of One who has privileged me to be your
protector--you are safe from any serious vexation; and the moment I am
gone, fly to my father, tell him openly your fears, and he will scatter
Julian's insolence to the winds of heaven."

"Thank you--thank you, wise dear Charles; you have lifted a load from my
poor, weak, woman's heart, that had weighed it down too heavily. I will
trust in God more, and dread Julian less. Oh! how I will pray for you
when far away."




CHAPTER X.

AUNT GREEN'S LEGACY.


AT last--at last, Mrs. Green fell ill, and, hard upon the over-ripe age
of eighty-seven, seemed likely to drop into the grave--to the
unspeakable delight of her expectant relatives. Sooth to say, niece
Jane, the soured and long-waiting legatee, had now for years been
treating the poor old woman very scurvily: she had lived too long, and
had grown to be a burden; notwithstanding that her ample income still
kept on the house, and enabled the general to nurse his own East India
Bonds right comfortably. But still the old aunt would not die, and as
they sought not her, nor heir's (quite contrary to St. Paul's
disinterestedness), she was looked upon in the light of an incumbrance,
on her own property and in her own house. Mrs. Tracy longed to throw off
the yoke of dependance, and made small secret of the hatred of the
fetter: for the old woman grew so deaf and blind, that there could be no
risk at all, either in speaking one's mind, or in thoroughly neglecting
her.

However, now that the harvest of hope appeared so near, the legatee
renewed her old attentions: Death was a guest so very welcome to the
house, that it is no wonder that his arrival was hourly expected with
buoyant cheerfulness, and a something in the mask of kindliness: but I
suspect that lamb-skin concealed a very wolf. So, Mrs. Tracy tenderly
inquired of the doctor, and the doctor shook his head; and other doctors
came to help, and shook their heads together. The patient still grew
worse--O, brightening prospect!--though, now and then, a cordial draught
seemed to revive her so alarmingly, that Mrs. Tracy affectionately
urging that the stimulants would be too exciting for the poor dear
sufferer's nerves, induced Dr. Graves to discontinue them. Then those
fearful scintillations in her lamp of life grew fortunately duller, and
the nurse was by her bed-side night and day; and the old aunt became
more and more peevish, and was more and more spoken of by the Tracy
family--in her possible hearing, as "that dear old soul"--out of it,
"that vile old witch."

Charles, to be sure, was an exception in all this, as he ever was: for
he took on him the Christian office of reading many prayers to the poor
decaying creature, and (only that his father would not hear of such a
thing) desired to have the vicar to assist him. Emily also, full of
sympathy, and disinterested care, would watch the fretful patient, hour
after hour, in those long, dull nights of pain; and the poor, old,
perishing sinner loved her coming, for she spoke to her the words of
hope and resignation. Whether that sweet missionary, scarcely yet a
convert from her own dark creed--(Alas! the Amina had offered unto
Juggernaut, and Emily of the strong hill-fort had scarcely heard of any
truer God; and the fair girl was a woman-grown before, in her first
earthly love, she also came to know the mercies Heaven has in store for
us)--whether unto any lasting use she prayed and reasoned with that
hard, dried heart, none but the Omniscient can tell. Let us hope: let us
hope; for the fretful voice was stilled, and the cloudy forehead
brightened, and the haggard eyes looked cheerfully to meet the
inevitable stroke of death. Thus in wisdom and in charity, in patience
and in faith, that gentle pair of lovers comforted the dying soul.

However, days rolled away, and Aunt Green lingered on still, tenaciously
clinging unto life: until one morning early, she felt so much better,
that she insisted on being propped up by pillows, and seeing all the
household round her bed to speak to them. So up came every one, in no
small hope of legacies, and what the lawyers call "_donationes mortis
causâ_."

The general was at her bed's-head, with, I am ashamed to say, perhaps
unconsciously, a countenance more ridiculous than lugubrious; though he
tried to subdue the buoyancy of hope and to put on looks of decent
mourning; on the other side, the long-expectant legatee, Niece Jane,
prudently concealed her questionable grief behind a scented
pocket-handkerchief. Julian held somewhat aloof, for the scene was too
depressing for his taste: so he affected to read a prayer-book, wrong
way up, with his tongue in his cheek: Charles, deeply solemnized at the
near approach of death, knelt at the poor invalid's bedside; and Emily
stood by, leaning over her, suffused in tears. At the further corners of
the bed, might be seen an old servant or two; and Mrs. Green's butler
and coachman, each a forty years' fixture, presented their gray heads at
the bottom of the room, and really looked exceedingly concerned.

Mrs. Green addressed them first, in her feeble broken manner:
"Grant--and John--good and faithful--thank you--thank you both; and you
too, kind Mrs. Lloyd, and Sally, and nurse--what's-your-name: give them
the packets, nurse--all marked--first drawer, desk: there--there--God
bless you--good--faithful."

The old servants, full of sorrow at her approaching loss, were comforted
too: for a kind word, and a hundred pound note a-piece, made amends for
much bereavement: the sick-nurse found her gift was just a tithe of
their's, and recognised the difference both just and kind.

"Niece Jane--you've waited--long--for--this day: my will--rewards you."

"O dear--dear aunt, pray don't talk so; you'll recover yet, pray--pray
don't:" she pretended to drown the rest in sorrow, but winked at her
husband over the handkerchief.

"Julian!" (the precious youth attempted to look miserable, and came as
called,) "you will find--I have remembered--you, Julian." So he winked,
too, at his mother, and tried to blubber a "thank you."

"Charles--where's Charles? give me your hand, Charles dear--let me feel
your face: here, Charles--a little pocket-book--good lad--good lad.
There's Emily, too--dear child, she came--too late--I forgot her--I
forgot her! general give her half--half--if you love--love--Emi--"

All at once her jaw dropped; her eyes, which had till now been
preternaturally bright, filmed over; her head fell back upon the pillow;
and the rich old aunt was dead.

Julian gave a shout that might have scared the parting spirit!

Really, the general was shocked, and Mrs. Tracy too; and the servants
murmured "shame--shame!" poor Charles hid his face; Emily looked up
indignantly; but Julian asked, with an oath, "Where's the good of being
hypocrites?" and then added, "now, mother, let us find the will."

Then the nurse went to close the dim glazed eyes; and the other
sorrowing domestics slunk away; and Charles led Emily out of the chamber
of death, saddened and shocked at such indecent haste.

Meanwhile, the hopeful trio rummaged every drawer--tumbled out the
mingled contents of boxes, desk, and escritoire--still, no will--no
will: and at last the nurse, who more than once had muttered, "Shame on
you all," beneath her breath, said,

"If you want the will, it's under her pillow: but don't disturb her yet,
poor thing!"

Julian's rude hand had already thrust aside the lifeless, yielding head,
and clutched the will: the father and mother--though humbled and
wonder-stricken at his daring--gathered round him; and he read aloud,
boldly and steadily to the end, though with scowling brow, and many
curses interjectional:

"IN the name of God, Amen. I, Constance Green, make this my last will
and testament. Forasmuch as my niece, Jane Tracy, has watched and waited
for my death these two-and-twenty years, I leave her all the shoes,
slippers, and goloshes, whereof I may happen to die possessed: item, I
leave Julian, her son, my '_Whole Duty of Man_,' convinced that he is
deficient in it all: item, I confirm all the gifts which I intend to
make upon my death-bed: item, forasmuch as General Tracy, my niece's
husband, on his return from abroad, greeted me with much affection, I
bequeath and give to him five thousand pounds' worth of Exchequer bills,
now in my banker's hands; and appoint him my sole executor. As to my
landed property, it will all go, in course of law, to my heir, Samuel
Hayley, and may he and his long enjoy it. And as to the remainder of my
personal effects, including nine thousand pounds bank stock, my Dutch
fives, and other matters, whereof I may die possessed (seeing that my
relatives are rich enough without my help), I give and bequeath the
same, subject as hereinbefore stated, to the trustees, for the time
being, of the Westminster Lying-in Hospital, in trust, for the purposes
of that charitable institution. In witness whereof, I have hereunto set
my hand and seal this 13th day of May, 1840.

                                                  "CONSTANCE GREEN."

"Duly signed, sealed, and delivered! d----nation!" was Julian's brief
epilogue--"General, let's burn it."

"You can if you please, Mr. Julian," interposed the nurse, who had
secretly enjoyed all this, "and if you like to take the consequences;
but, as each of the three witnesses has the will sealed up in copy, and
the poor deceased there took pains to sign them all, perhaps--"

This settled the affair: and the discomfited expectants made a
precipitate retreat. As the general, however, got vastly more than he
expected, for his individual merits; and seeing that he loved Emily as
much as he hated both Julian and his wife, he really felt well-pleased
upon the whole, and took on him the duties of executor with
cheerfulness. So they buried Aunt Green as soon as might be.




CHAPTER XI.

PREPARATIONS AND DEPARTURE.


CHARLES'S pocket-book was full of clean bank notes, fifteen hundred
pounds' worth: it contained also a diamond ring, and a lock of silvery
hair; the latter a proof of affectionate sentiment in the kind old soul,
that touched him at the heart.

"And now, my Emmy, the way is clear to us; Providence has sent me this,
that I may right you, dearest: and it will be wise in us to say nothing
of our plans. Avoid inquiries--for I did not say conceal or falsify
facts: but, while none but you, love, heed of my departure, and while I
go for our sakes alone, we need not invite disappointment by
open-mouthed publicity. To those who love me, Emmy, I am frank and
free; but with those who love us not, there is a wisdom and a justice in
concealment. They do not deserve confidence, who will not extend to us
their sympathy. None but yourself must know whither I am bound; and,
after some little search for curiosity's sake, when a week is past and
gone, no soul will care for me of those at home. With you, I will manage
to communicate by post, directing my letters to Mrs. Sainsbury, at
Oxton: I will prepare her for it. She knows my love for you, and how
they try to thwart us; but even she, however trustworthy, need not be
told my destination yet awhile, until 'India' appears upon the
post-mark. How glad will you be, dearest one, how happy in our
secret--to read my heart's own thoughts, when I am far away--far away,
clearing up mine Emmy's cares, and telling her how blessed I feel in
ministering to her happiness!"

Such was the substance of their talk, while counting out the
pocket-book.

Charles's remaining preparations were simple enough, now his purse was
flush of money: he resolved upon taking from his home no luggage
whatever: preferring to order down, from an outfitting house in London,
a regular kit of cadet's necessaries, to wait for him at the Europe
Hotel, Plymouth, on a certain day in the ensuing week. So that, burdened
only with his Emmy's miniature, and his pocket-book of bank notes, he
might depart quietly some evening, get to Plymouth in a prëconcerted
way, by chaise or coach, before the morrow morning; thence, a boat to
meet the ship off-shore, and then--hey, for the Indies!

It was as well-devised a scheme as could possibly be planned; though its
secresy, especially with a mother in the case, may be a moot point as to
the abstract moral thereof: nevertheless, concretely, the only heart his
so mysterious absence would have pained, was made aware of all: then,
again, secresy had been the atmosphere of his daily life, the breath of
his education; and he too sorely knew his mother would rejoice at the
departure, and Julian, too--all the more certainly, as both brothers
were now rivals professed for the hand of Emily Warren: as to the
general, he might, or he might not, smoke an extra cheroot in the
excitement of his wonder; and if he cared about it anyways more
tragically than tobacco might betray, Emily knew how to comfort him.

With respect to other arrangements, Emmy furnished Charles with letters
to certain useful people at Madras, and in particular to the "somebody"
who looked after Mrs. Mackie: so, the mystery was easy of access, and he
doubted not of overcoming, on the spot, every unseen difficulty. The
plan of leaving all luggage behind, a capital idea, would enable him to
go forth freely and unshackled, with an ordinary air, in hat and
great-coat, as for an evening's walk; and was quite in keeping with the
natural reserve of his whole character--a bad habit of secresy, which he
probably inherited from his father, the lieutenant of old times. And
yet, for all the wisdom, and mystery, and shrewd settling of the plan,
its accomplishment was as nearly as possible most fatally defeated.

The important evening arrived; for the Indiaman--it was our old friend
Sir William Elphinston--would be off Plymouth, next morning: the goods
had been, for a day or two, safely deposited at the Europe, as per
invoice, all paid: the lovers, in this last, this happiest, yet by far
the saddest of their stolen interviews, had exchanged vows and kisses,
and upon the beach, beneath those friendly cliffs, had commended one
another to their Father in heaven. They had returned to the unsocial
circle of home; all was fixed; the clock struck nine: and Charles,
accidentally squeezing Emily's hand, rose to leave the tea-table.

"Where are you going, Mr. Charles?"

"I am going out, Julian."

"Thank you, sir! I knew that, but whither? General, I say, here's
Charles going to serenade somebody by moonlight."

The brandy-sodden parent, scarcely conscious, said something about his
infernal majesty; and, "What then?--let him go, can't you?"

"Well, Julian dear, perhaps your brother will not mind your going with
him; particularly as Emily stays at home with me."

This Mrs. Tracy spoke archly, intended as a hint to induce Julian to
remain: but he had other thoughts--and simply said, in an ill-tempered
tone of voice, "Done, Charles."

It was a dilemma for our escaping hero; but glancing a last look at
Emily, he departed, and walked on some way as quietly as might be with
Julian by his side: thinking, perhaps, he would soon be tired; and
suffering him to fancy, if he would, that Charles was bound either on
some amorous pilgrimage, or some charitable mission. But they left
Burleigh behind them--and got upon the common--and passed it by, far out
of sight and out of hearing--and were skirting the high banks of the
darkly-flowing Mullet--and still there was Julian sullenly beside him.
In vain Charles had tried, by many gentle words, to draw him into common
conversation: Julian would not speak, or only gave utterance to some
hinted phrase of insult: his brow was even darker than usual, and night
was coming on apace, and he still tramped steadily along beside his
brother, digging his sturdy stick into the clay, for very spite's sake.
At length, as they yet walked along the river's side in that
unfrequented place, Julian said, on a sudden, in a low strange tone, as
if keeping down some rising rage within him,

"Mr. Charles, you love Emily Warren."

"Well, Julian, and who can help loving her?"

It was innocently said; but still a maddening answer, for he loved her
too.

"And, sirrah," the brother hoarsely added, "she--she does not--does
not--hate you, sir, as I do."

"My good Julian, pray do not be so violent; I cannot help it if the dear
girl loves me."

"But I can, though!" roared Julian, with an oath, and lifted up his
stick--it was nearer like a club--to strike his brother.

"Julian, Julian, what are you about? Good Heavens! you would not--you
dare not--give over--unhand me, brother; what have I done, that you
should strike me? Oh! leave me--leave me--pray."

"Leave you? I will leave you!" the villain almost shouted, and smote him
to the ground with his lead-loaded stick. It was a blow that must have
killed him, but for the interposing hat, now battered down upon his
bleeding head. Charles, at length thoroughly aroused, though his foe
must be a brother, struggled with unusual strength in self-preserving
instinct, wrested the club from Julian's hand, and stood on the
defensive.

Julian was staggered: and, after a moment's irresolution, drawing a
pistol from his pocket, said, in a terribly calm voice,

"Now, sir! I have looked for such a meeting many days--alone, by night,
with you! I would not willingly draw trigger, for the noise might bring
down other folks upon us, out of Oxton yonder: but, drop that stick, or
I fire."

Charles was noble enough, without another word, to fling the club into
the river: it was not fear of harm, but fear of sin, that made him trust
himself defenceless to a brother, a twin-brother, in the dark: he could
not be so base, a murderer, a fratricide! Oh! most unhallowed thought!
Save him from this crime, good God! Then, instantaneously reflecting,
and believing he decided for the best, when he saw the ruffian glaring
on him with exulting looks, as upon an unarmed rival at his mercy, with
no man near to stay the deed, and none but God to see it, Charles
resolved to seek safety from so terrible a death in flight.

Oxton was within one mile; and, clearly, this was not like flying from
danger as a coward, but fleeing from attempted crime, as a brother and
a Christian. Julian snatched at him to catch him as he passed: and,
failing in this, rushed after him. It was a race for life! and they went
like the wind, for two hundred yards, along that muddy high-banked walk.

Suddenly, Charles slipped upon the clay, that he fell; and Julian, with
a savage howl, leapt upon him heavily.

Poor youth, he knew that death was nigh, and only uttered, "God forgive
you, brother! oh, spare me--or, if not me, spare yourself--Julian,
Julian!"

But the monster was determined. Exerting the whole force of his
herculean frame, he seized his scarce-resisting victim as he lay, and,
lifting him up like a child, flung his own twin-brother head foremost
into that darkly-flowing current!

There was one piercing cry--a splash--a struggle; and again nothing
broke upon the silent night, but the murmur of that swingeing tide, as
the Mullet hurried eddying to the sea.

Julian listened a minute or two, flung some stones at random into the
river, and then hastily ran back to Burleigh, feeling like a Cain.




CHAPTER XII.

THE ESCAPE.


BUT the overruling hand of Him whose aid that victim had invoked, was
now stretched forth to save! and the strong-flowing tide, that ran too
rapidly for Charles to sink in it, was commissioned from on High to
carry him into an angle of that tortuous stream, where he clung by
instinct to the bushes. Silence was his wisdom, while the murderer was
near: and so long as Julian's footsteps echoed on the banks, Charles
stirred not, spoke not, but only silently thanked God for his wonderful
deliverance. However, the footsteps quickly died away, though heard far
off clattering amid the still and listening night; and Charles,
thankfully, no less than cautiously, drew himself out of the stream,
very little harmed beyond a drenching: for the waters had recovered him
at once from the effects of that desperate blow.

It was with a sense of exultation, freedom, independence, that he now
hastened scatheless on his way; dripping garments mattered nothing, nor
mud, nor the loss of his demolished hat: the pocket-book was safe, and
Emmy's portrait, (how he kissed it, then!) and luckily a travelling cap
was in his great-coat pocket: so with a most buoyant feeling of animal
delight, as well as of religious gratitude, he sped merrily once more
upon his secret expedition. Thank Heaven! Emmy could not know the peril
he had past: and wretched Julian would now have dreadful reason of his
own for this mysterious absence: and it was a pleasant thing to trudge
along so freely in the starlight, on the private embassy of love. Happy
Charles! I know not if ever more exhilarated feelings blessed the youth;
they made him trip along the silent road, in a gush of joyfulness, at
the rate of some six miles an hour; I know not if ever such delicious
thoughts of Emily's attachment, and those gorgeous mysteries in India,
of adventure, enterprise, escape, had heretofore caused his heart to
bound so lightsomely within him, like some elastic spring. I know not if
ever strong reliance upon Providential care, more earnest prayers,
praises, intercessions (for poor Julian, too,) were offered on the altar
of his soul. Happy Charles!

So he went on and on--long past Oxton, and Eyemouth, and Surbiton, and
over the ferry, and through the sleeping turnpikes, and past the bridge,
and along the broad high-road, until gray of morning's dawn revealed the
suburbs of Plymouth.

Of course he missed the mail by which he intended to have gone--for
Julian's dread act delayed him.

Long before his journey's end, his clothes were thoroughly dried, and
violent exercise had shaken off all possible rheumatic consequence of
that fearful plunge beneath the waters: five-and-twenty miles in four
hours and three-quarters, is a tolerable recipe for those who have
tumbled into rivers. We must recollect that he had gone as quick as he
could, for fear of being late, now the coach had passed. At a little
country inn, he brushed, and washed, and made toilet as well as he was
able, took a glass of good Cognac, both hot and strong; and felt more of
a man than ever.

Then, having loitered awhile, and well-remembered Emily in his prayers,
at about eight in the morning he presented himself among his luggage at
the Europe in gentlemanly trim, and soon got all on board the pilot
boat, to meet the Indiaman just outside the breakwater. We may safely
leave him there, happy, hopeful Charles! Sanguine for the future,
exulting in the present, and thankful for the past: already has he
poured out all his joys before that Friend who loves her too, and
invoked His blessing on a scheme so well designed, so providentially
accomplished.

I had almost forgotten Julian: wretched, hardened man, and how fared he?
The moment he had flung his brother into that dark stream, and the
waters closed above him greedily that he was gone--gone for ever, he
first threw in stones to make a noise like life upon the stream, but
that cheatery was only for an instant: he was alone--a murderer, alone!
the horrors of silence, solitude, and guilt, seized upon him like three
furies: so his quick retreating walk became a running; and the running
soon was wild and swift for fear; and ever as he ran, that piercing
scream came upon the wind behind, and hooted him: his head swam, his
eyes saw terrible sights, his ears heard terrible sounds--and he scoured
into quiet, sleeping Burleigh like a madman. However, by some strange
good luck, not even did the slumbering watchman see him: so he got
in-doors as usual with the latch-key (it was not the first time he had
been out at night), crept up quietly, and hid himself in his own
chamber.

And how did he spend those hours of guilty solitude? in terrors? in
remorse? in misery? Not he: Julian was too wise to sit and think, and in
the dark too; but he lit both reading lamps to keep away the gloom, and
smoked and drank till morning's dawn to stupify his conscience.

Then, to make it seem all right, he went down to breakfast as usual,
though any thing but sober, and met unflinchingly his mother's natural
question--

"Good morning, Julian--where's Charles?"

"How should I know, mother; isn't he up yet?"

"No, my dear; and what is more, I doubt if he came home last night."

"Hollo, Master Charles! pretty doings these, Mr. Sabbath-teacher! so he
slept out, eh, mother?"

"I don't know--but where did you leave him, Julian?"

"Who! I? did I go out with him? Oh! yes, now I recollect: let's see, we
strolled together midway to Oxton, and, as he was going somewhat
further, there I left him?"

How true the words, and yet how terribly false their meaning!

"Dear me, that's very odd--isn't it, general?"

"Not at all, ma'am--not at all; leave the lad alone, he'll be back by
dinner-time: I didn't think the boy had so much spirit."

Emily, to whom the general's hint was Greek, looked up cheerfully and in
her own glad mind chuckled at her Charles's bold adventure.

But the day passed, off, and they sent out men to seek for him: and
another--and all Burleigh was a-stir: and another--and the coast-guards
from Lyme to Plymouth Sound searched every hole and corner: and
another--when his mother wept five minutes: and another--when the wonder
was forgotten.

However, they did not put on mourning for the truant: he might turn up
yet: perhaps he was at Oxford.

Emily had not much to do in comforting the general for his dear son's
loss; it clearly was a gain to him, and he felt far freer than when
wisdom's eye was on him. Charles had been too keen for father, mother,
and brother; too good, too amiable: he saw their ill, condemned it by
his life, and showed their dark too black against his brightness. The
unnatural deficiency of mother's love had not been overrated: Julian had
all her heart; and she felt only obliged to the decamping Charles for
leaving Emily so free and clear to his delightful brother. She never
thought him dead: death was a repulsive notion at all times to her: no
doubt he would turn up again some day. And Julian joked with her about
that musty proverb "a bad penny."

As to our dear heroine, she never felt so happy in all her life before
as now, even when her Charles had been beside her; for within a day of
his departure he had written her a note full of affection, hope, and
gladness; assuring her of his health, and wealth, and safe arrival on
board the Indiaman. The noble-hearted youth never said one single word
about his brother's crime: but he did warn his Emmy to keep close beside
the general. This note she got through Mrs. Sainsbury; that invalid lady
at Oxton, who never troubled herself to ask or hear one word beyond her
own little world--a certain physic-corner cupboard.

And thou--poor miserable man--thou fratricide in mind--and to thy best
belief in act, how drags on now the burden of thy life? For a day or
two, spirits and segars muddled his brain, and so kept thoughts away:
but within a while they came on him too piercingly, and Julian writhed
beneath those scorpion stings of hot and keen remorse: and when the
coast-guards dragged the Mullet, how that caitiff trembled! and when
nothing could be found, how he wondered fearingly! The only thing the
wretched man could do, was to loiter, day after day, and all day long,
upon the same high path which skirts the tortuous stream. Fascinated
there by hideous recollections, he could not leave the spot for hours:
and his soft-headed, romantic mother, noticing these deep abstractions,
blessed him--for her Julian was now in love with Emily.




CHAPTER XIII.

NEWS OF CHARLES.


AY--in love with Emily! Fiercely now did Julian pour his thoughts that
way; if only hoping to forget murder in another strong excitement.
Julian listened to his mother's counsels; and that silly, cheated woman
playfully would lean upon his arm, like a huge, coy confidante, and fill
his greedy ears (that heard her gladly for very holiday's sake from
fearful apprehensions), with lover's hopes, lover's themes, his Emily's
perfection. Delighted mother--how proud and pleased was she! quite in
her own element, fanning dear Julian's most sentimental flame, and
scheming for him interviews with Emily.

It required all her skill--for the girl clung closely to her guardian:
he, unconscious Argus, never tired of her company; and she, remembering
dear Charles's hint, and dreading to be left alone with Julian, would
persist to sit day after day at her books, music, or needle-work in the
study, charming General Tracy by her pretty Hindoo songs. With him she
walked out, and with him she came in; she would read to him for hours,
whether he snored or listened; and, really, both mother and son were
several long weeks before their scheming could come to any thing. A
_tête-à-tête_ between Julian and Emily appeared as impossible to manage,
as collision between Jupiter and Vesta.

However, after some six weeks of this sort of mining and counter-mining
(for Emily divined their wishes), all on a sudden one morning the
general received a letter that demanded his immediate presence for a day
or two in town; something about prize-money at Puttymuddyfudgepoor.
Emily was too high-spirited, too delicate in mind, to tell her guardian
of fears which never might be realized; and so, with some forebodings,
but a cheerful trust, too, in a Providence above her, she saw the
general off without a word, though not without a tear; he too, that
stern, close man, was moved: it was strange to see them love each other
so.

The moment he was gone, she discreetly kept her chamber for the day, on
plea of sickness; she had cried very heartily to see him leave her--he
had never yet left her once since she could recollect--and thus she
really had a head-ache, and a bad one.

Julian Tracy gave such a start, that he knocked off a cheffonier of
rare china and glass standing at his elbow; and the smash of mandarins
and porcelain gods would have been enough, at any other time, to have
driven his mother crazy.

"Charles alive?" shouted he.

"Yes, Julian--why not? You saw him off, you know: cannot you remember?"

Now to that guilty wretch's mind the fearful notion instantaneously
occurred, that Emily Warren was in some strange, wild way bantering him;
she knew his dreadful secret--"he _had_ seen him off." He trembled like
an aspen as she looked on him.

"Oh yes, he remembered, certainly; but--but where was her letter?"

"Never mind that, Julian; you surely would not read another person's
letters, Monsieur le Chevalier Bayard?"

Emily was as gay at heart that morning as a sky-lark, and her innocent
pleasantry proved her strongest shield. Julian dared not ask to see the
letter--scarcely dared to hope she had one, and yet did not know what to
think. As to any love scene now, it was quite out of the question,
notwithstanding all his mother's hints and management; a new exciting
thought entirely filled him: was he a Cain, a fratricide, or not? was
Charles alive after all? And, for once in his life, Julian had some
repentant feelings; for thrilling hope was nigh to cheer his gloom.

It really seemed as if Emily, sweet innocent, could read his inmost
thoughts. "At any rate," observed she, playfully, "Bayard may take the
postman's privilege, and see the outside."

With that, she produced the ship-letter that had put her in such
spirits, legibly dated some twenty-two days ago. Yes, Charles's hand,
sure enough! Julian could swear to it among a thousand. And he fainted
dead away.

What an astonishing event! how Mrs. Tracy praised her noble-spirited
boy! How the bells rang! and hot water, and cold water, and salts, and
rubbings, and _eau de Cologne_, and all manner of delicate attentions,
long sustained, at length contributed to Julian's restoration. Moreover,
even Emily was agreeably surprised; she had never seen him in so amiable
a light before; this was all feeling, all affection for his brother--her
dear--dear Charles. And when Mrs. Tracy heard what Emily said of
Julian's feeling heart, she became positively triumphant; not half so
much at Charles's safety, and all that, as at Julian's burst of feeling.
She was quite right, after all; he was worthy to be her favourite, and
she felt both flattered and obliged to him for fainting dead away.
"Yes--yes, my dear Miss Warren, depend upon it Julian has fine feelings,
and a good heart." And Emily began to condemn both Charles and herself
for lack of charity, and to think so too.




CHAPTER XIV.

THE TETE-A-TETE.


NO sooner had "dear Julian" recovered, which he really had not quite
accomplished until the day had begun to wear away (so great a shock had
that intelligence of Charles been to his guilty mind), than the
gratified and prudent mother fancied this a famous opportunity to leave
the young couple to themselves. It was after dinner, when they had
retired to the drawing-room; and I will say that Emily had never seemed
so favourably disposed towards that rough, but generous, heart before.
So then, on some significant pretence, well satisfied her favourite was
himself again, as bold, and black, and boisterous as ever, the masculine
mother kissed her hand to them, as a fat fairy might be supposed to do,
and operatically tripped away, coyly bidding Emily "take care of Julian
till she should come back again."

The momentary gleam of good which glanced across that bad man's heart
has faded away hours ago; his repentant thoughts had been occasioned
more from the sudden relief he experienced at running now no risks for
having murdered, than for any better feeling towards his brother, or any
humbler notions of himself. Nay, a strong rëaction occurred in his ideas
the moment he had seen his brother's writing; and when he fainted, he
fainted from the struggle in his mind of manifold exciting causes, such
as these:--hatred, jealousy, what he called love, though a lower name
befitted it, and vexation that his brother was--not dead. Oh mother,
mother! if your poor weak head had but been wise enough to read that
heart, would you still have loved it as you do? Alas--it is a deep
lesson in human nature this--she would! for Mrs. General Tracy was one
of those obstinate, yet superficial characters, whom no reason can
convince that they are wrong, no power can oblige to confess themselves
mistaken. She rejoiced to hear him called "her very image;" and
predominant vanity in the large coquette extended to herself at
second-hand; self was her idol substance, and its delightful shadow was
this mother's son.

The moment Mrs. Tracy left the room, Julian perceived his opportunity:
Charles, detested rival, far away at sea; the guardian gone to London;
Emily in an unusual flow of affability and kindness, and he--alone with
her. Rashly did he bask his soul in her delicious beauty, deliberately
drinking deep of that intoxicating draught. Giving the rein to passion,
he suffered that tumultuous steed to hurry him whither it would, in mad
unbridled course. He sat so long silently gazing at her with the
lack-lustre eyes of low and dull desire, that Emily, quite thrown off
her guard by that amiable fainting for his brother, addressed him in her
innocent kind-heartedness,

"Are you not recovered yet, dear Julian?"

The effect was instantaneous: scarcely crediting his ears that heard her
call him "dear," his eyes, that saw her winning smile upon him, he
started from his chair, and trembling with agitation, flung himself at
her feet, to Emily's unqualified astonishment.

"Why, Julian, what's the matter?--unhand me, sir! let go!" (for he had
got hold of her wrist.)

The passionate youth seized her hand--that one with Charles's ring upon
it--and would have kissed it wildly with polluting lips, had she not
shrieked suddenly "Help! help!"

Instantly his other hand was roughly dashed upon her mouth--so roughly
that it almost knocked her backwards--and the blood flowed from her
wounded lip; but by a preternatural effort, the indignant Indian queen
hurled the ruffian from her, flew to the bell, and kept on ringing
violently.

In less than half a minute all the household was around her, headed by
the startled Mrs. Tracy, who had all the while been listening in the
other drawing-room: butler, footmen, house-maids, ladies'-maids, cook,
scullions, and all rushed in, thinking the house was on fire.

No need to explain by a word. Emily, radiant in imperial charms, stood,
like inspired Cassandra, flashing indignation from her eyes at the
cowering caitiff on the floor. The mother, turning all manner of
colours, dropped on her knees to "poor Julian's" assistance, affecting
to believe him taken ill. But Emily Warren, whose insulted pride
vouchsafed not a word to that guilty couple, soon undeceived all
parties, by addressing the butler in a voice tremulous and broken--

"Mr. Saunders--be so good--as to go--to Sir Abraham Tamworth's--in the
square--and request of him--a night's--protection--for a
poor--defenceless, insulted woman!"

She could hardly utter the last words for choking tears: but immediately
battling down her feelings, added, with the calmness of a heroine--

"You are a father, Mr. Saunders--set all this before Sir Abraham
strongly, but delicately.

"Footmen! so long as that wretch is in the room, protect me, as you are
men."

And the stately beauty placed herself between the two liveried lacqueys,
as Zenobia in the middle of her guards.

"Marguerite!"--the pretty little Française tripped up to her--"wipe this
blood from my face."

Beautiful, insulted creature! I thought that I looked upon some wounded
Boadicea, with her daughters extracting the arrow from her cheek.

"And now, kind Charlotte, fetch my cloak; and follow me to Prospect
House, with what I may require for the night. Till the general's return,
I stay not here one minute."

Then, without a syllable, or a look of leave-taking, the wise and noble
girl--doubtless unconsciously remembering her early Hindoo braveries,
the lines of matchlock men, the bowing slaves, the processions, and her
jewelled state of old--marched away in magnificent beauty, accompanied
in silence by the whole astonished household.

Mrs. Tracy and her son were left alone: the silly, silly mother thought
him "hardly used." Julian, whose natural effrontery had entirely
deserted him, looked like what he was--a guilty coward: and the mother,
who had pampered up her "fine high-spirited son" to his full-grown
criminality by a foolish education, really--when she had time to think
of any thing but him--was excessively frightened. The general would be
back to-morrow, and then--and then!--she dreaded to picture that
explosion of his wrath.




CHAPTER XV.

SATISFACTION.


SIR ABRAHAM TAMWORTH, G.C.B.--a fine old Admiral of the White, who
somewhat looked down upon the rank of General, H.E.I.C.S.--was
astonished, as well he might be, at Mr. Saunders, and his message: and,
of course, most gladly acquiesced in acting as poor Emily's protector.
Accordingly, however jealous Lady Tamworth and her daughters might
heretofore have felt of that bright beauty at the balls, they were now
all genuine sympathy, indignation, and affection. Emily, I need hardly
say, went straight up stairs to have her cry out.

"Whom are you writing to, George, in such a hurry?" asked the admiral,
of a fine moustachioed son, George St. Vincent Tamworth, of the Royal
Horse Guards, who had just got six months' leave of absence for the sake
of marriage with his cousin.

The gallant soldier tossed a billet to his father, who mounted his
spectacles, and quietly read it at the lamp.

"Captain Tamworth desires Mr. Julian Tracy's company to-morrow morning,
at seven o'clock, in the third meadow on the Oxton road. The captain
brings a friend with him; also pistols and a surgeon; and he desires Mr.
Tracy to do the like: Prospect House, Thursday evening."

"So, George, you consider him a gentleman, do you? I am afraid it's a
poor compliment to our fair young friend." And he quietly crumpled up
the challenge in his iron hand.

"Really, sir!--you surprise me;--pardon me, but I will send that note:
mustn't I chastise the fellow for this insufferable outrage?"

"No doubt, George, no doubt of it at all: when a lady is insulted, and a
man (not to say a queen's officer) stands by without taking notice of
it, he deserves whipping at the cart's-tail, and Coventry for life. I've
no patience, boy, with such mean meekness, as putting up with bullying
insolence when a woman's in the case. Let a man show moral courage, if
he can and will, in his own affront; I honour him who turns on his heel
from common personal insult, and only wish my own old blood was cool
enough to do so: but the mother, wife, and sister, ay, George, and the
poor defenceless one, be she lady, peasant, or menial, who comes to us
for safety in a woman's dress, we must take up their quarrel, or we are
not men!--"

"Don't interrupt him, George," uxoriously suggested Lady Tamworth,
"your father hasn't done talking yet." For George was getting terribly
impatient; he knew, from sad experience, how much the admiral was given
to prosing. However, the oration soon proceeded to our captain's entire
satisfaction, after his progenitor had paused awhile for breath's sake
in his eloquence.

"--Take up their quarrel, or we are not men. Nevertheless, boy, I cannot
see the need of pistols. The only conceivable case for violent redress,
is woman's wrong: and he who wrongs a woman, cannot be a gentleman;
therefore, ought not to be met on equal terms. For other causes of
duello, as hot-headed speeches, rudenesses, or slights, forgive, forbear
to fan the flame, and never be above apologizing: but in an outrage such
as this, let a fine-built fellow, such as you are, George (and the women
should show wisdom in their choice of champions), let a man, and a
queen's officer as you are, treat this brute, Julian Tracy, as a
martinet huntsman would a hound thrown out. As for me, boy, I'm going to
call on Mrs. Tracy at eleven o'clock to-morrow morning--and, without
presuming to advise a six foot two of a son, I think--I think, if I were
you, I would be dutiful enough to say--'Father, I will accompany
you--and take a horsewhip with me.'"

"Agreed, agreed, sir!" replied the well-pleased son, and her ladyship
too vouchsafed her approbation.

Emily had gone to bed long ago, or rather to her chamber; where the
three Misses Tamworth had been all kindness, curiosity, and consolation.
So, Sir Abraham and his lady, now the speech was finished, followed
their example of retirement: and the captain newly blood-knotted his
hunting-whip, _con amore_, not to say _con spirito_, overnight.

Nobody will wonder to hear, that when the gallant representatives of
army and navy called next morning at number seven, Mrs. Tracy and her
son were "not at home:" and of course it would be far too Julian-like a
proceeding, for true gentleman to think of forcing their company on the
probably ensconced in-dwellers. Accordingly, they marched away, without
having deigned to leave a card; the captain taking on himself the duty
of perambulating sentinel, while his father proceeded to the library as
usual. Judge of the glad surprise, when, within ten minutes, our
vindictive George perceived the admiral coming back again, full-sail,
with the mother and son in tow, creeping amicably enough up the terrace.
Sir Abraham had given her his arm, and precious Mr. Julian was a little
in the rear: for the old folks were talking confidentially.

George St. Vincent, placing his whip in the well-known position of
"Cane, a mystery," advanced to meet them; and, just after passing his
father, with whom he exchanged a very comfortable glance, discovered
that the heroic Julian, who had caught a glimpse of the ill-concealed
weapon, was slinking quickly round a corner to avoid him. It was
certainly undignified to run, but the gallant captain did run,
nevertheless and soon caught the coward by the collar.

Then, at arm's length, was the hunting-whip applied, full-swing; up the
terrace, and down the parade, and through High-street, and Smith-street,
and Oxton-road, and aristocratical Pacton-square, and the well-thronged
plebeian market-place; lash, lash, lash, in furious and fast succession
on the writhing roaring culprit; to the universal excoriation of Mr.
Julian Tracy, and the amazement of an admiring and soon-collected
crowd--the rank, beauty, and fashion--of Burleigh Singleton. Julian was
strong indeed, and a coal-heaver in build, but conscience had unnerved
him; and the coarse noisy bully always is a coward: therefore, it was a
pleasant thing to see how easy came the captain's work to him--he had
nothing to do but to lash, lash, lash, double-thonged, like a
slave-driver: and, except that he made the caitiff move along, to be a
spectacle to man and woman, up and down the town, he might as well, for
any difficulty in the deed, have been employed in scarifying a
gate-post.

At last, thoroughly exhausted with having inflicted as much punishment
as any three drummers at a soldier's whipping-match, and spying out his
"tiger" in the throng, our gallant Avenging Childe tossed the heavy whip
to the trim cockaded little man, that he might carry home that
instrument of vengeance, deliberately wiped his wet mustachios, and
giving Julian one last kick, let the fellow part in peace.




CHAPTER XVI.

HOW CHARLES FARED.


HAVING thus found protectors for poor Emily, and disposed of her
assailant to the entire satisfaction of all mankind, let us turn
seawards, and take a look at Charles.

Now, "no earthly power,"--as a certain ex-chancellor protested--shall
induce me to do so mean a thing as to open Charles's letters, and spread
them forth before the public gaze. Doubtless, they were all things
tender, warm, and eloquent; doubtless, they were tinted rosy hue, with
love's own blushes, and made glorious with the golden light of
unaffected piety. I only read them myself in a reflected way, by looking
into Emily's eyes; and I saw, from their ever-changing radiance, how
feelingly he told of his affections; how fervently he poured out all his
heart upon the page; how evidently tears and kisses had made many words
illegible; how wise, sanguine, happy, and religious, was her own devoted
Charles.

Of the trivial incidents of voyaging, his letters said not much: though
cheerful and agreeable in his floating prison, with the various exported
marrying-maidens and transported civil officers, who constitute the
average bulk of Indian cargoes outward bound, Charles mixed but little
in their society, seldom danced, seldom smoked, seldom took a hand at
whist, or engaged in the conflicts of backgammon. Sharks, storms,
water-spouts; the meeting divers vessels, and exchanging post-bags;
tar-barrelled Neptune of the line, Cape Town with its mountain and the
Table-cloth, long-rolling seas; and similar common-places, Charles did
not think proper to enlarge upon: no more do I. Life is far too short
for all such petty details: and, more pointedly, a wire-drawn book is
the just abhorrence of a generous public.

The letters came frequently: for Charles did little else all day but
write to Emmy, so as always to be ready with a budget for the next piece
of luck--a home-bound ship. He had many things to teach her yet, sweet
student; and it was a beautiful sight to see how her mind expanded as an
opening flower before the sun of tenderness and wisdom. Each letter,
both in writing and in reading, was the child of many prayers: and even
the loveliness of Emily grew more soft, more elevated, "as it had been
the face of an angel," when feeding in solitary joy on those effusions
of her lover's heart.

Of course, he could not hear from her, until the overland mail might
haply bring him letters at Madras: so that, as our Irish friends would
say, with all her will to tell him of her love, "the reciprocity must
needs be all on one side." But Emily did write too; earnestly, happily:
and poured her very heart out in those eloquent burning words. I dare
say Charles will get the letter now within a day or two: for the roaring
surf of Madras is on the horizon, almost within sight.

Nevertheless, before he gets there, and can read those
letters--precious, precious manuscripts--it will be my painful duty, as
a chronicler of (what might well be) truth, to put the reader in
possession of one little hint, which seemed likeliest to wreck the
happiness of these two children of affection.

I am Emily's invisible friend: and as the dear girl ran to me one
morning, with tears in her eyes, to ask me what I thought of a certain
mysterious paragraph, I need not scruple to lay it straight before the
reader.

At the end of a voluminous love-letter, which I really did not think of
prying into, occurred the following postscript, evidently written at the
last moment of haste.

"Oh! my precious Emmy, I have just heard the most fearful rumour of ill
that could possibly befall us: the captain of our ship--you will
remember Captain Forbes, he knew you and the general well, he said--has
just assured me that--that--! I dare not, cannot write the awful words.
Oh! my own Emmy--Heaven grant you be my own!--pray, pray, as I will
night and day, that rumour be not true: for if it be, my love, both God
and man forbid us ever to meet again! How I wish I could explain it all,
or that I had never heard so much, or never written it here, and told it
you, though thus obscurely: for I can't destroy this letter now, the
ships are just parting company, and there is no time to write another.
Yet will I hope, love, against hope. Who knows? through God's good
mercy, it may all be cleared up still. If not--if not--strive to forget
for ever, your unhappy                                 "CHARLES.

"Perhaps--O, glorious thought!--Nurse Mackie may know better than the
captain, after all; and yet, he seems so positive: if he is right, there
is nothing for us both but Wo! Wo! Wo!"

Now, to say plain truth, when Emily showed me this, I looked very blank
upon it. That Charles had heard some meddlesome report, which (if true)
was to be an insuperable barrier to their future union, struck me at a
glimpse. But I had not the heart to hint it to her; and only encouraged
hope--hope, in God's help, through the means of Mrs. Mackie and her
papers.

As for the poor girl herself, she asked me, in much humility, and with
many sobs, if I did not fear that her Hindoo mystery was this:--she was
the vilest of the vile, a Pariah, an outcast, whose very presence is
contamination!

Beautiful, loving, heavenly-hearted creature! so humble in the midst of
her majestic loveliness! how touching was the thought, that she thus
readily acquiesced in any the deepest humiliation holy Providence had
seen fit to send her; and though the sentence would have crushed her
happiness for ever, till the day of death, that she could still look up
and say, "Be it to thine handmaid even as thou wilt."

As I had no better method of explaining the matter, and as her infantine
reminiscences and prejudices about caste were strong, I even let her
think so, if she would: it was a far better alternative than my own sad
thoughts about the business: and, however painful was the process, it
was something consolatory to observe, that this voluntary humiliation
mellowed and chastened her own character, subduing tropical fires, and
tempering the virgin gold by meekness.

Oh! Charles, Charles, my poor fellow, "who have cast your all upon a
die, and must abide the issue of the throw," I most fervently hope that
gossiping Captain Forbes spoke falsely: it is a comfort to reflect that
the world is often very liberal in attributing the honours of paternity
to some who really do not deserve them. And if a rich old bachelor looks
kindly on a foundling, is it not pure malice on that sole account of
charity to hail him father? Besides--there's Nurse Mackie.--Speed to
Madras, poor youth, and keep your courage up.




CHAPTER XVII.

THE GENERAL'S RETURN.


IN a most unwonted flow of animal spirits, and an entire affability
which restored him at once to the rank of a communicative creature,
General Tracy came back on Friday night. He had met with marvellous
prosperity; for Hancock's had been paying off the prize-money; and his
own lion's share, as general, in the easy process of dethroning half a
dozen diamond-hilted rajahs and nabobs, amounted to something like four
lacs of rupees, nearly half a crore! Such a flush of wealth, and he was
rich already without it, exhilarated the bilious old gentleman so
strangely, that positive peonies were blooming in his cheeks; and, as if
this was not miracle enough, he had brought his wife as a present
Maurice's '_Antiquities of India_,' gloriously bound, and had even been
so superfluous as to purchase a new pair of double-barrelled pistols for
Julian: the lad was a fine young fellow after all, and ought to be
encouraged in snuffing out a candle; as for Emily's _petit cadeau_, it
was a fifty guinea set of cameos, the choicest in their way that Howell
and James's had to show him. Moreover, he had sent a Bow-street officer
to Oxford, to make inquiries after Charles: actually, good fortune had
made him at once humanized and happy.

So the chaise rattled up, and the general bounded out, and flew into the
arms of his wondering wife, as Paris might have flown to Helen, or
Leander to his heroine--the only feminine Hero, whom grammar recognises.
It was past eleven at night: therefore he did not think to ask for
Julian; no doubt the boy was gone to bed.

Indeed, he had; and was tossing his wealed body, full of pains, and
aches, and bruises, as softly as he could upon the feather-bed: he had
need of poultices all over, and a quart of Friar's Balsam would have
done him little good: after his well-merited thrashing, the flogged
hound had slunk to his kennel, and locked himself sullenly in, without
even speaking to his mother. Tobacco-fumes exuded from the key-hole, and
I doubt not other creature-comforts lent the muddled man their aid.

However, after the first rush of news to Mrs. Tracy, her lord, who had
every moment been expecting the door to fly open, and Emily to fall into
his arms--for strangely did they love each other--suddenly asked,

"But, where's Emmy all this time! she knows I'm here?--not got to bed,
is she?--knew I was coming?--"

"Oh! general, I'll tell you all about it to-morrow morning."

"About what, madam? Great God! has any harm befallen the child?
Speak--speak, woman!"

"Dear--dear--Oh! what shall I say?" sobbed the silly mother.
"Emily--Emily, poor dear Julian--"

"What the devil, ma'am, of Julian?" The general turned white as a sheet,
and rang the bell, in singular calmness; probably for a dram of brandy.
Saunders answered it so instantly, that I rather suspect he was waiting
just outside.

The moment Mrs. Tracy saw the gray-headed butler, anticipating all that
he might say, she brushed past him, and hurriedly ran up-stairs.

"What's all this, Mr. Saunders? where's Miss Warren?" And the poor old
guardian seemed ready to faint at his reply: but he heard it out
patiently.

"I am very sorry to say, general, that Miss Emily has been forced to
take refuge at Sir Abraham Tamworth's: but she's well, sir, and safe,
sir; quite well and safe," the good man hastened to say, "only I'm
afraid that Mr. Julian had been taking liberties with--"

I dare not write the general's imprecation: then, as he clenched the
arms of his easy-chair, as with the grasp of the dying, he asked, in a
quick wild way--

"But what was it?--what happened?"

"Nothing to fear, sir--nothing at all, general;--I am thankful to say,
that all I saw, and all we all saw, was Miss Emily pulling at the
bell-rope with blood upon her face, and Mr. Julian on the floor: but I
took the young lady to Sir Abraham's immediately, general, at her own
desire."

The father arose sternly; his first feeling was to kill Julian; but the
second, a far better one, predominated--he must go and see Emily at
once.

So, faintly leaning on the butler's arm, the poor old man (whom a moiety
of ten minutes, with its crowding fears, had made to look some ten years
older,) proceeded to the square, and knocked up Sir Abraham at midnight,
and the admiral came down, half asleep, in dressing-gown and slippers,
vexed at having been knocked up from his warm berth so uncomfortably: it
put him sorely in remembrance of his hardships as a middy.

"Kind neighbour, thank you, thank you; where's Emmy? take me to my
Emmy;" and the iron-hearted veteran wept like a driveller.

Sir Abraham looked at him queerly: and then, in a cheerful, friendly
way, replied--

"Dear general, do not be so moved: the girl's quite safe with us; you'll
see her to-morrow morning. All's right; she was only frightened, and
George has given the fellow a proper good licking: and the girl's a-bed,
you know; and, eh? what?"--

For the poor old man, like one bereaved, said, supplicatingly--

"In mercy take me to her--precious child!"

"My dear sir--pray consider--it's impossible; fine girl, you know;--Lady
Tamworth, too--can't be, can't be, you know, general."

And the mystified Sir Abraham looked to Saunders for an explanation--

"Was his master drunk?"

"I must speak to her, neighbour; I must, must, and will--dear, dear
child: come up with me, sir, come; do not trifle with a breaking heart,
neighbour!"

There was a heart still in that hard-baked old East Indian.

It was impossible to resist such an appeal: so the two elders crept up
stairs, and knocked softly at her chamber-door. Clearly, the girl was
asleep: she had sobbed herself to sleep; the general had been looked for
all day long, and she was worn with watching; he could hardly come at
midnight; so the dear affectionate child had sobbed herself to sleep.

"Allow me, Sir Abraham." And General Tracy whispered something at the
key-hole in a strange tongue.

Not Aladdin's "open Sesame" could have been more magical. In a moment,
roused up suddenly from sleep, and forgetting every thing but those
tender recollections of gentle care in infancy, and kindness all through
life, the child of nature startled out of bed, drew the bolt, and in
beauteous disarray, fell into that old man's arms!

It was enough; he had seen her eye to eye--she lived: and the
white-haired veteran, suffered himself to be led away directly from the
landing, like a child, by his sympathizing neighbour.

"My heart is lighter now, Sir Abraham: but I am a poor weak old man, and
owe you an explanation for this outburst; some day--some day, not now.
O, if you could guess how I have nursed that pretty babe when alone in
distant lands; how I have doated on her little winning ways, and been
gladdened by the music of her prattle; how I have exulted to behold her
loveliness gradually expanding, as she was ever at my side, in peril as
in peace, in camp as in quarters, in sickness as in health,
still--still, the blessed angel of a bad man's life--a wicked, hard old
man, kind neighbour--if you knew more--more, than for her sake I dare
tell you--and if you could conceive the love my Emmy bears for me, you
would not think it strange--think it strange--" He could not say a
syllable more; and the admiral, with Mr. Saunders, too, who joined them
in the study, looked very little able to console that poor old man. For
they all had hearts, and trickling eyes to tell them.

Then having arranged a shake-down for his master in Sir Abraham's
study--for the guardian would not leave his dear one ever
again--Saunders went home, purposing to attend with razors in the
morning.




CHAPTER XVIII.

INTERCALARY.


THE Tamworths did not altogether live at Burleigh Singleton--it was far
too petty a place for them; dullness all the year round (however
pleasant for a month or so, as a holiday from toilsome pleasures) would
never have done for Lady Tamworth and her daughters: but they regularly
took Prospect House for six weeks in the summer season, when tired of
Portland Place, and Huntover, their fine estate in Cheshire: and so,
from constant annual immigration, came as much to be regarded
Burleighites, as swifts and swallows to be ranked as British birds. I
only hint at this piece of information, for fear any should think it
unlikely, that grandees of Sir Abraham's condition could exist for ever
in a place where the day-before-yesterday's '_Times_' is first
intelligence.

Moreover, as another interjectional touch, it is only due to my
life-likenesses to record, that Mrs. Green's, although a terrace-house,
and ranked as humble number seven, was, nevertheless, a tolerably
spacious mansion, well suited for the dignity of a butler to repose in:
for Mrs. Green had added an entire dwelling on the inland side, as, like
most maritime inhabitants, she was thoroughly sick of the sea, and never
cared to look at it, though living there still, from mere disinclination
to stir: so, then, it was quite a double house, both spacious and
convenient. As for the inglorious incident of Julian's latch-key, I
should not wonder if many wide street-doors to many marble halls are
conscious of similar convenient fastenings, if gentlemen of Julian's
nocturnal tastes happen to be therein dwelling. Another little matter is
worth one word. The house had been Mrs. Green's, a freehold, and was,
therefore, now her heir's; but the general, as an executor, remained
there still, until his business was finished; in fact, he took his
year's liberty.

He had returned from India rolling in gold; for some great princess or
other--I think they called her a Begum or a Glumdrum, or other such like
Gulliverian appellative--had been singularly fond of him, and had loaded
him in early life with favours--not only kisses, and so forth, but
jewellery and gold pagodas. And lately, as we know, Puttymuddyfudgepoor,
with its radiating rajahs and nabobs, had proved a mine of wealth: for a
crore is ten lacs, and a lac of rupees is any thing but a lack of
money--although rupees be money, and the "middle is distributed;" in
spite of logic, then, a lack means about twelve thousand pounds: and
four of them, according to Cocker, some fifty thousand. It would appear
then, that with the produce of the Begum's diamonds, converted into
money long ago, and some of them as big as linnet's eggs--and not to
take account of Mrs. Green's trifling pinch of the five Exchequer bills,
all handed over at once to Emily--the General's present fortune was
exactly one hundred and twenty-three thousand pounds.

Of course, _he_ wasn't going to bury himself at Burleigh Singleton much
longer; and yet, for all that stout intention of houses and lands, and
carriages and horses, in almost any other county or country, it is as
true as any thing in this book, that he was a resident still, a
lease-holder of Aunt Green's house, long after the _dénouement_ of this
story; in many things an altered man, but still identical in one; the
unchangeable resolve (though never to be executed) of leaving Burleigh
at farthest by next Michaelmas. Most folks who talk much, do little; and
taciturn as the general now is, and has been ever throughout life, it
will surprise nobody who has learned from hard experience how silly and
harmful a thing is secresy (exceptionables excepted), to find that he
grew to be a garrulous old man, gossipping for ever of past, present,
future, and, not least, about his deeds at Puttymuddyfudgepoor.

General Tracy is by this time awake again; if ever indeed he slept on
that uncomfortable shakedown; and, after Mr. Saunders and the
razor-strop, has greeted brightly-beaming Emily with more than usual
tenderness. Her account of the transaction made his very blood boil;
especially as her pretty pouting lips were lacerated cruelly inside:
that rude blow on the mouth had almost driven the teeth through them.
How confidingly she told her artless tale; how gently did her fond
protector kiss that poor pale cheek; and how sternly did he vow full
vengeance on the caitiff! Not even Emily's intercession could avail to
turn his wrath aside. He could hardly help flying off at once to do
something dreadful; but common courtesy to all the Tamworth family
obliged him to defer for an hour all the terrible things he meant to do.
So he began to bolt his breakfast fiercely as a cannibal, and saluted
Lady Tamworth and her daughters with such savage looks, that the captain
considerately suggested:

"Here, general," (handing him a most formidable carving-knife,) "charge
that boar's head, grinning defiance at us on the side-board; it will do
you good to hew his brawny neck. My mother, I am sure, for one, will
thank you to do the honours there instead of me. Isn't it a comfort now,
to know that I broke the handle of my hunting-whip across the fellow's
back, and wore all the whip-cord into skeins. Come, I say, general,
don't eat us all round; and pray have mercy on that poor, flogged,
miserable sinner."

This banter did him good, especially as he saw Emily smiling; so he
relaxed his knit brow, condescended to look less like Giant Blunderbore,
soon became marvellous chatty, and ate up two French rolls, an egg, some
anchovies, a round of toast, and a mighty slice of brawn; these, washed
down with a couple of cups of tea, soothed him into something like
complacency.




CHAPTER XIX.

JULIAN'S DEPARTURE.


LONG before the general got home, still in exalted dudgeon (indeed soon
after the general had left home over night), the bird had flown; for the
better part of valour suggested to our evil hero, that it would be
discreet to render himself a scarce commodity for a season; and as soon
as ever his mother had run up to his room-door to tell him of his
danger, when her lord was cross-questioning the butler, he resolved upon
instant flight. Accordingly, though sore and stiff, he hurried up,
dressed again, watched his father out, and tumbling over Mrs. Tracy, who
was sobbing on the stairs, ran for one moment to the general's room;
there he seized a well-remembered cash-box, and instinctively possessed
himself of those new, neat, double-barrelled pistols: a bully never goes
unarmed. These brief arrangements made, off he set, before his father
could have time to return from Pacton Square.

Therefore, when the general called, we need not marvel that he found him
not; no one but the foolish mother (so neglected of her son, yet still
excusing him) stood by to meet his wrath. He would not waste it on her;
so long as Julian was gone, his errand seemed accomplished; for all he
came to do was to expel him from the house. So, as far as regarded Mrs.
Tracy, her husband, wotting well how much she was to blame, merely
commanded her to change her sleeping-room, and occupy Mr. Julian's in
future.

The silly woman was even glad to do it; and comforted herself from time
to time with prying into her own boy's exemplary manuscripts, memoranda
of moralities, and so forth; with weeping, like Lady Constance, over his
empty "unpuffed" clothes; with reading ever and anon his choice
collection of standard works, among which '_Don Juan_' and Mr. Thomas
Paine were by far the most presentable; and with tasting, till it grew
to be a habit, his private store of spirituous liquors. Thus did she
mourn many days for long-lost Julian.

I am quite aware what became of him. The wretched youth, mad for Emily's
love, and tortured by the tyranny of passion, had nothing else to live
for or to die for. He accordingly took refuge in the hovel of a
smuggler, an old friend of his, not many miles away, disguised himself
in fisherman's costume, and bode his opportunity.

Beauteous girl! how often have I watched thee with straining eyes and
aching heart, as thou wentest on thy summer's walk so oftentimes to
Oxton, there to exercise thy bountiful benevolence in comforting the
sick, gladdening the wretched, and lingering, with love's own look, in
Charles's village school; how often have I prayed, that guardian angels
might be about thy path as about thy bed! For the prowling tiger was on
thy track, poor innocent one, and many, many times nothing but one of
God's seeming accidents hath saved thee. Who was that strange man so
often in the way? At one time a wounded Spanish legionist, with head
bound up; at another, an old beggar upon crutches; at another, a floury
miller with a donkey and a sack; at another, a black looking man, in
slouching sailor's hat and fishing-boots?

Fair, pure creature! thou hast often dropped a shilling in that beggar's
hand, and pitied that poor maimed soldier; once, too, a huge gipsy woman
would have had thee step aside, and hear thy fortunes. Heaven guarded
thee then, sweet Emily; for both girl and lover though thou art, thou
would'st not listen to the serpent's voice, however fair might be the
promises. And Heaven guarded thee ever, bidding some one pass along the
path just as the ruffian might have gagged thy smiling mouth, and
hurried thee away amongst his fellows; and more than once, especially,
those school children, bursting out of Charles's school at dusk, have
unconsciously escorted thee in safety from the perils of that tiger on
thy track.




CHAPTER XX.

ENLIGHTENMENT.


THE general could not now be kept in ignorance of Charles's expedition;
in fact, he had found his heart, and began resolutely to use it. So, the
very day on which he had lost Julian, he intended very eagerly to seek
out Charles; for the Oxford search had failed, and no wonder. Now,
though Emily had told, as we well know, to both mother and son her
secret, the father was not likely to be any the wiser; for he now never
spoke to his wife, and could not well speak to his son. However, one
day, an hour after an overland letter, a very exhilarating one, dated
Madras, whereof we shall hear anon, fair Emily, in the fullness of her
heart, could not help saying,

"Dearest sir, you are often thinking of poor lost Charles, I know; and
you are very anxious about him too, though nobody but myself, who am
always with you, can perceive it: what if you heard he was safe and
well?"

"Have you heard any tidings of my poor boy, Emmy?"

She looked up archly, and said, "Why not?" her beautiful eyes adding, as
plainly as eyes could speak, "I love him, and you know it; of course I
have heard frequently from dear, dear Charles."

But the guardian met her looks with a keen and chilling answer: "Why
not! why not! Does he dare to write to you, and you to love him? Oh,
that I had told them both a year ago! But where is he now, child? Don't
cry, I will not speak so angrily again, my Emmy."

"I hardly dare to tell you, dearest sir: you have always been as a
father to me, and I never knew any other; but there are things I cannot
explain to myself, and I was very wretched; and so, kind guardian,
Charles--Charles was so good--"

"What has he done?--where has he gone?" hastily asked his father.

"Oh, don't, don't be angry with us; in a word, he is gone to Madras, to
find out Nurse Mackie, and to tell me who I am."

The poor old man, who had treasured up so long some mystery, probably a
very diaphanous one, for Emily's own dear sake in the world's esteem,
and from the long bad habit of reserve, fell back into his chair as if
he had been shot; but he did not faint, nor gasp, nor utter a sound; he
only looked at her so long and sorrowfully, that she ran to him, and
covered his pale face with her own brown curls, kissing him, and wiping
from his cheek her starting tears.

"Emmy, dear--I can tell you--and I--no, no, not now, not now; if he
comes back--then--then; poor children! Oh, the sin of secresy!"

"But, dearest sir, do not be so sad; Charles has happy news, he says."

"Happy, child? Good Heaven! would it could be so!"

"Indeed, indeed, a week ago he was as miserable as any could be, and so
was I; for he heard something terrible about me--I don't know what--but
I feared I was a--Pariah! However, now he is all joy, and coming home
again as soon as possible."

The general shook, his head mournfully, as physicians do when hope is
gone; but still he looked perplexed and thoughtful.

"You will show me the letters, dear, I dare say: but I do not command
you, Emmy; do as you like."

"Certainly, my own kindest guardian--all, all, and instantly."

And flying up to her room, she returned with as much closely-written
manuscript as would have taken any but a lover's eye a full week to
decipher. The general, not much given to literary matters, looked quite
scared at such a prospect.

"Wait, Emmy; not all, not all; show me the last."

I dare say Emily will forgive me if I get it set up legibly in print.
May I, dear?




CHAPTER XXI.

CHARLES AT MADRAS.


LUCKILY enough for all mankind in general, and our lovers in particular,
Charles's last letter was very unlike some that had preceded it; for
instead of the usual "Oh, my love"'s, "sweet, sweet eyes," "darling"'s,
and all manner of such chicken-hearted nonsense, it was positively
sensible, rational, not to say utilitarian: though I must acknowledge
that here and there it degenerates into the affectionate, or
Stromboli-vein of letter-writing, at opening especially; and really now
and then I shall take leave to indicate omitted inflammations by a *.

"DEAREST, DEAREST EMMY,

       *       *       *       *       *

[and so forth, a very galaxy of stars to the bottom of this page; enough
to put the compositor out of his terrestrial senses.]

"You see I have recovered my spirits, dearest, and am not now afraid to
tell you how I love you. Oh, that detestable Captain Forbes! let him not
cross my path, gossiping blockhead! on pain of carrying about 'til
deth,' in the middle of his face, a nose two inches longer. I heartily
wish I had never listened for an instant to such vile insinuations; and
when I look at this red right hand of mine, that dared to pen the trash
in that black postscript, I look at it as Cranmer did, and (but that it
is yours, Emmy, not mine), could wish it burnt. But no fears now, my
girl, huzza, huzza! I believe every one about me thinks me daft; and so
I am for very joyfulness; notwithstanding, let me be didactic, or you
will say so too. I really will endeavour to rein in, and go along in the
regular hackney trot, that you may partly comprehend me. Well, then,
here goes; try your paces, Dobbin.

"On the morning of Sunday, April 11th, 1842, the good ship
Elphinston--(that's the way to begin, I suppose, as per ledger,
log-book, and midshipman's epistles to mamma)--in fact, dear, we cast
anchor just outside a furious wall of surf, which makes Madras a very
formidable place for landing; and every one who dares to do so certain
of a watering. There lay the city, most invitingly to storm-tost tars,
with its white palaces, green groves, and yellow belt of sand, blue
hills in the distance, and all else _coleur de rose_. But--but, Emmy,
there was no getting at this paradise, except by struggling through a
couple of miles of raging foam, that would have made mince-meat of the
Spanish Armada, and have smashed Sir William Elphinston to pieces. How,
then, did we manage to survive it? for, thank God always, here I am to
tell the tale. Listen, Emmy dear, and I will try not to be tedious.

"We were bundled out of the rolling ship into some huge flat-bottomed
boats, like coal-barges, and even so, were grated and ground several
times by the churning waves on the ragged reefs beneath us: and, just as
I was enjoying the see-saw, and trying to comfort two poor drenched
women-kind who were terribly afraid of sharks, a huge, cream-coloured
breaker came bustling alongside of us, and roaring out 'Charles Tracy,'
gobbled me up bodily. Well, dearest, it wasn't the first time I had
floundered in the waters [noble Charles! noble Charles! he had long
forgiven Julian]; so I was battling on as well as I could, with a stout
heart and a steady arm, when--don't be afraid--a _Catamaran_ caught me!
If you haven't fainted (bless those pretty eyes of your's, my Emmy!)
read on; and you will find that this alarming sort of animal is neither
an albatross nor an alligator, but simply--a life-boat with a Triton in
the stern. Yes, God's messenger of life to me and happiness to you, my
girl, came in the shape of a kindly, chattering, blue-skinned, human
creature, who dragged me out of the surf, landed me safely, and, I need
not say, got paid with more than hearty thanks. So, I scuffled to the
custom-house to look after my traps and fellow-passengers, like a
dripping merman.

"'Who is that miserable old woman, bothering every body?' asked I of a
very civil searcher, profuse in his salaams.

"'Oh, Sahib, you will know for yourself, presently: she's always hanging
about here, to get news of somebody in England, I believe--and to try to
find a charitable captain who will take her all the way for nothing:
rather too much of a good thing, you know, Sahib.'

[We really cannot undertake to scribble broken English: so we will
translate any thing that may mysteriously have been chatted by
havildars, and coolies; and all manner of strange names.]

"'Poor old soul--she looks very wretched: what's her name?' asked I,
carelessly.

"'Oh, I never troubled to inquire, Sahib: I believe she was an old
servant left behind as lumber, and she pesters every one, day by day,
about some 'bonnie bonnie bairn.''

"In a moment, Emmy, I had seized on dear nurse Mackie!

"Very old, very deaf, very infirm--she fancied I was driving her away,
as many others might have done; and, with a truly piteous face,
pleaded--

"'Gude sir, have mercy on a puir auld soul--and let her ask for her
sweet young mistress, only once, sir--only once more.'

"'Emily Warren?' said I.

"Her wrinkled face brightened over as with glory--and she answered--

"'Bless the mouth that spake it, and these ears that hear her name!
yes--yes--yes--they call her so; where is she? how is she? have you seen
her? is she yet alive?'

"Leading away the affectionate old soul from the crowd that was
collecting round us, I left orders about luggage as a traveller should,
and then told her all I knew: and I know you pretty well, I think, my
Emmy.

"Her joy was like a mad woman's: the dear old Hecate pranced, and
danced, and sung, and shouted like nothing but a mother when she finds
her long-lost child: not that she's your mother, Emmy dear.
No--no--matters are better than that: all she vouchsafes, though, to
tell me is, that you are a lady born and bred, and--for I cannot find
the words to inform your pure mind clearer--that 'you are not what he
thinks you.'"

[Here followeth another twinkling universe of stars;

       *       *       *       *       *       *       *

and thereafter our cavalier condescendeth again to matters of fact.]

"Nurse Mackie of course comes back with me next packet; this letter goes
by the overland mail more quickly than we can; gladly would I go too,
but the old woman, whose life is essential to your rights, would die of
fatigue by the way; as it is, I am obliged to coddle her, and feed her,
and ptisan her, like a sick baby, bless her dear old heart that loves my
darling Emmy! She has a pack of papers with her, which she will not
open, till the general is by her side: if she unfortunately dies before
we can return, I am to have them, and all will be right. But the old
soul is so afraid of being left behind (as you throw away the
orange-peel after you have squeezed it), that she will not tell me a
word about them yet; so, I only gather what I can from her cautious
garrulity, hints about a Begum and a captain, and the Stuarts, and a
Putty-what-d'ye-call-it. And it is all in document, as well as
_viva-voce_ (this means 'gossip,' dear). So now you may be expecting us,
as soon as ever we can get to you. Tell the general all this, and give
him my best love, next after your's Emmy; for he is my father still, and
my very heart yearns after him: O, that he were kinder with me as I see
he is with you, dear, and more open with us all! Also, kiss, if she will
let you, my mother for me, and I hope you will have hinted to her long
ago, that I am only playing truant. How is poor--poor Julian? he will
understand me, if you tell him I forgive him, and will never say one
word about our little tiff. And now dearest Emmy--"

[The remainder of this letter must, believe me, be as starry as before.]

       *       *       *       *       *




CHAPTER XXII.

REVELATIONS.


GENERAL TRACY gave a long-drawn sigh: and tears--tears of true
affection--stood in those most fish-like eyes, as he mournfully said,
"Bless him, bless dear Charles, almost as much as you, my own sweet
Emmy. Heaven send it be true--for Heaven can work miracles. But without
a miracle, Emily, in sober sadness I declare it, you must forget--_your
brother Charles, my daughter_!"

Emily fell flat upon her face, so cold, so white, that he believed her
dead.

Oh! that he had never--never said that word: or better still, poor
father, that you had never kept the dreadful secret from them. The
adultery, indeed, was sin; but years of ill-concealings have multiplied
its punishment. Wretched father--wretched children! that must bear an
erring father's curse.

Oh! that Jeanie Mackie may have reasons, proofs; and be not an impostor
after all, dressing up a tale that over-sanguine Charles may bring her
back again to Scotland. Well--well! I am full of sadness and
perplexities: but we shall hear it out anon. Heaven help them!

Emily was taken very ill, and had a long fit of sickness. Day and
night--night and day, did her poor wasting anxious father watch by her
bed-side, gentle as the gentlest nurse--tender as the tenderest of
mothers. And, indeed, the Lord of Life and Wisdom was gracious to them
both; raising up the poor weak child again; and teaching that old man,
through this daughter of his shame and sin in youth, that religion is a
cure for all things. Ay, "the blessed angel of a bad man's life,"
indeed--indeed was she; and he humbly knelt, as little children kneel,
that hard and dried old man; and his eyes caught the ray of Heaven's
mercy, looking up in joy to read forgiveness; and his heart was bathed
in penitence--the rock flowed out amain; and his mind was quickened into
faith--he lived, he breathed "a new-born babe," that poor and bad old
man, given to the prayers of his own daughter!

All this while, Mrs. Tracy, thrown upon her own resources, has been
continually tasting dear Julian's store, and finding out excuses for his
trivial peccadilloes. And when, from the recesses of his desk, she had
routed out (in company with sundry more, rather contrasting with a
mother's pure advice) a few of her own letters, which had not yet been
destroyed, she would doat by the hour on these proofs of his affection.
And then, her spirits were so low; and his choice smuggled Hollands so
requisite to screw them up to par again; and no sooner had they rallied,
than they would once more begin to droop; so she cried a good deal, and
kept her bed; and very often did not remember exactly, whether she was
lying down there, or figuring on the Esplanade with Julian, and--all
that sort of thing: accordingly, it is not to be wondered at if, in
Aunt Green's double-house, the general and Emily saw very little of her,
and during all this illness, had almost forgotten her existence.
Nevertheless, she was alive still, and as vast as ever--though a course
of strong waters had shattered her nerves considerably; even more so,
than her real mother's grief at Julian's protracted absence.

Never had he been heard of since he left, hard heart; though he might
have guessed a mother's sorrow, and was not far away, and often lingered
near the house in strange disguises. It would have been easy for him, in
some clever way or other, latch-key and all, to have gained access to
her, and comforted her, and given her some real proof, that all the love
she had shed on him had not been utterly thrown away; but he didn't--he
didn't; and I know not of a darker trait in Julian's whole career; he
was insensible to love--a mother's love.

For love is the weapon which Omnipotence reserved to conquer rebel man;
when all the rest had failed. Reason he parries; Fear he answers blow to
blow; future interest he meets with present pleasure; but Love, that sun
against whose melting beams the Winter cannot stand, that soft-subduing
slumber which wrestles down the giant, there is not one human creature
in a million--not a thousand men in all earth's huge quintillion, whose
clay-heart is hardened against love.

Yet was Julian one of those select ones; an awful instance of that
possible, that actual, though happily that scarcest of all characters, a
man,

        "Black, with _no_ virtue, and a thousand crimes."

The amiable villain--one whose generosity redeems his guilt, whose
kindliness outweighs his folly, or whose beauty charms the eye to
overlook his baseness--this too common hero is an object, an example
fraught with perilous interest. Charles Duval, the polite; Paul
Clifford, the handsome; Richard Turpin, brave and true; Jack Sheppard,
no ignoble mind and loving still his mother; these, and such as these,
with Schiller's '_Robbers_' and the like, are dangerous to gaze on, as
Germany, if not England too, remembers well. But, not more true to life,
though far less common to be met with, is Julian's incorrigible mind:
one, in whose life are no white days; one, on whose heart are no bright
spots; when Heaven's pity spoke to him, he ridiculed; as, when His
threatenings thundered, he defied. Of this world only, and tending to a
worse appetite was all he lived for: and the core of appetite is iron
selfishness.

The filched cash-box proved to be too well-filled for him to trouble
himself with thinking of his mother yet awhile: and his smuggling
acquaintances, a rough-featured, blasphemous crew, set him as their
chief, so long as he swore loudest, drank deepest, and had money at
command. He hid the money, that they should not secretly steal from him
that to which he owed his bad supremacy; and his double-barrels, shotted
to the muzzle, were far too formidable for any hope of getting at it by
open brute force. Nevertheless, they were "fine high-spirited" fellows
those, bold, dark men, of Julian's own kidney; who toasted in their cups
each other's crimes, and the ghost or two that ought to have been
haunting them.




CHAPTER XXIII.

CONVALESCENCE.


VERY slowly did Emily recover, for the blow had been more than she could
bear: nothing but religion gave her any chance at all: and the phials,
blisterings, bleedings, would have been in vain, in vain--she must have
died long ago--had it not been for the remembrance of God's love,
resignation to His will, and trust in the wisdom of his Providence. But
these specific remedies gradually brought her round, while the kind-eyed
doctors praised their own prescriptions: and after many rallyings and
relapses, delirious ramblings, and intervals of hallowed Christian
peace, the eye of Love's meek martyr brightened up once more, and health
flushed again upon her cheek.

She recovered, God be praised! for her death would have been poor
Charles's too; and the same grave that yawned for her and him would have
closed upon their father also. Even as it was, when she arose from off
the weary bed of sickness, it was to be a nurse herself, and watch
beside that patient, weak old man. He could not bear her out of his
sight all the fever through; but eagerly would listen to her hymns and
prayers, joining in them faintly like a dying saint. With the saddening
secret, which had so long pressed upon his mind, he seemed to have
thrown off his old nature, as a cast skin: and now he was all frankness
for reserve, all piety for profaneness, all peacefulness for blusterings
and wrath.

He remembered then poor Julian and his mother: taking blame to himself,
justly, deeply, for neglected duties, chilling lack of sympathy, and
that dull domestic sin, that still continued evil of unnatural
omissions--stern reserve. And he would gladly have seen Julian by his
bedside, to have freely forgiven the lad, and welcomed him home again,
and begun once more, in openness and charity, all things fair and new:
but Julian was not to be found, though rewards were offered, and
placards posted up, and emissaries from the Detective Police-force
sought him far and wide. Alas! the bold bad man had heard with scorn of
his father's penitence, and knew that he would gladly have received
him;--but what cared he for kindnesses or pardons? He only lived to
waylay Emily.

As for Mrs. Tracy, she was seldom in a state to appear; but one day she
managed to refrain a little, and came to see her husband, almost sober.
I was, authorially speaking, behind the door, and saw and heard as
follows:

The old man, worn and emaciate, was weakly sitting up in bed, and Emma
by his side, with the Bible in her lap: she casually shut it as the
mother entered.

"Well, Miss Warren, there's a time for all things; but this is neither
morning, noon, nor night: nor Sunday either, nor holiday, that I know
of; it's eleven o'clock on Tuesday, Miss--and I think you might as well
leave the general at peace, without troubling him for ever with your
prayer-books and your Bibles."

"Jane, my dear, I requested it of Emily; come and sit by me, and take my
hand, wife."

"Thank you, sir, you are very obliging: not while that young woman is in
the room.--You ought to be ashamed of yourself, General Tracy."

Poor Emmy ran away to weep. It seems that, in her delirium, she had
spoken many things, and the servants blabbed them out to Mrs. Tracy.

"Ah, my poor wife, indeed I am: both ashamed and sorry--heartily sorry.
But God forgives me, Jenny, and I hope that you will too."

"Upon, my word, general, you carry it off with a high hand: and, not
content, sir, with insulting me in my own home by bringing here your
other women's children, you have expelled poor dear, dear Julian."

"Jane, if you will remember, he ran away himself; and you know that now
I gladly would receive him: we are all prodigal sons together, and if
God can bear with us, Jane, we ought to look kindly on each other."

"Ha! that's always the way with old sinners like you--canting
hypocrites! Be a man, General Tracy, if you can, and talk sense. I never
did any harm or sin in all my life yet, and don't intend to: and my
poor boy Julian's well enough, if they'd only let him alone; but nobody
understands his heart but me. Good boy, I'm sure there's virtue enough
left in him, if he loves his mother."--_If_ he loves his mother.

"Jane, dear, I sent for you to kiss you; for I could not die in peace,
nor live in peace (whichever God may please), without your pardon, Jane,
for a thousand unkindnesses--but, especially for the sin that gave me
Emily. Forgive me this, my wife."

"Never, sir!" rejoined that miserable mind; and fancied that she was
acting virtuously. She thrust aside the kindly proffered hand; scowled
at him with darkened brow; drew up her commanding height; and, calling
Mrs. Siddons to remembrance, brushed away in the indignant attitude of a
tragedy queen.

Emmy ran again to her father, and the vain bad mother to her bottle; we
must leave them to their various avocations.




CHAPTER XXIV.

CHARLES DELAYED.


FEW things could well be more unlikely than that Emily should hear of
Charles again before she saw him: for, having left Madras as speedily as
might be, now that his mission was so easily, yet so naturally,
accomplished--having posted, as we know, his overland letter--and having
got on board the fast-sailing ship Samarang, Captain Trueman, Charles,
in the probable course of things, if he wrote at all, must have been his
own postman. But the Fates--(our Christianity can afford to wink now and
then at Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos; for, at any rate, they are as
reasonable creatures as Chance, Luck, and Accident,)--the Fates willed
it otherwise: and, accordingly, it is in my power to lay before the
reader another genuine lucubration of Charles Tracy.

A change had come over the spirit of their dream, those youthful lovers:
and agonizing doubt must rack their hearts, threatening to rend them
both asunder. It is evident to me that Charles's letter (which Emily
showed to me with a melancholy face) was on principle less warm, less
dottable with stars, and more conversant with things of this world;
high, firm, honourable principle; intending very gently, very gradually,
to wean her from him, if he could; for his faith in Jeanie Mackie had
been shaken, and--but let us hear him tell us of it all himself.

                                        "I.E.M. Samarang. St. Helena.

"You will wonder, my dear Emily, to hear again before you see me: but I
am glad of this providential opportunity, as it may serve to prepare us
both. Naturally enough you will ask, why Charles cannot accompany this
letter? I will tell you, dear, in one word--Mrs. Mackie is now lying
very ill on shore; and, as far as our poor ship is concerned, you shall
hear about it all anon. Several of the passengers, who were in a hurry
to get home, have left us, and gone in the packet-boat that takes you
this letter: gladly, as you know, would I have accompanied them, for I
long to see you, poor dear girl; but it was impossible to leave the old
woman, upon whom alone, under God, our hopes of earthly happiness
depend: if, alas! we still can dream about such hopes.

"Oh, Emily--I heartily wish that, having finished my embassage by that
instantaneous finding of the old Scotch nurse, I had never been so
superfluous as to have left those letters of introduction, wherewith you
kindly supplied me, in an innocent wish to help our cause. But I felt
solitary too, waiting at Madras for the next ship to England; and in my
folly, forgetful of the single aim with which I had come, Jeanie Mackie,
to wit, I thought I might as well use my present opportunities, and see
what I could of the place and its inhabitants.

"With that view, I left my letters at Government House, at Mr.
Clarkson's, Colonel Bunting's, Mrs. Castleton's, and elsewhere,
according to direction; and immediately found answer in a crowd of
invitations. I need not vex you nor myself, Emmy, writing as I do with a
heavy, heavy heart, by describing gayeties in which I felt no pleasure,
even when amongst them, for my Emmy was not there: splendour,
prodigality, and red-hot rooms, only made endurable by perpetually
fanning punkahs: pompous counsellors, authorities, and other men in
office, and a glut of military uniforms: vulgar wealth, transparent
match-making, and predominating dullness: along with some few of the
charities and kindnesses of life (Mrs. Bunting, in particular, is an
amiable, motherly, good-hearted woman), all these you will readily fancy
for yourself.

"My trouble is deeper than any thing so slight as the common satiations
of _ennui_: for I have heard in these circles in which your--my--the
general, I mean, chiefly mixed, so much of that ill-rumour that it
cannot all be false: they knew it all, and were certain of it all, too
well, Emily, dear. And I have been pestering Nurse Mackie night and day;
but the old woman is so afraid of being left behind any where, or thrown
overboard, or dropped, upon some desert rock, that she is quite cross,
and won't say a single word in answer, even when I tell her all these
terrible tales. Her resolution is, not to reveal one syllable more,
until she sets foot on England; and several people at Madras annoyed me
exceedingly by saying, that this kind of thing is an old trick with
people who wish to be sent home again. She has hidden away her papers
somewhere; not that I was going to steal them: but it shows how little
trust she puts in any thing, or any one, except the keeping of her own
secret. However, she does adhere obstinately, and hopefully for us, to
her original hint, 'you are not what he thinks you;' although she will
not condescend to any single proof, or explanation, against the mighty
mass of evidence, which probabilities, and common rumour, and the
general's own belief, have heaped together. When I call you Emmy,
too--the old soul, in her broad Scotch way, always corrects me, and
invokes a blessing upon 'A-amy:' so there is a mystery somewhere: at
least, I fervently hope there is: and, if the old woman has been playing
us false, let us resign ourselves to God, my girl; for our fate will be
that matters are as people say they are--and then my old black
postscript ends too truly with a wo, wo, wo--!

"But I must shake off all this lethargy of gloom, dearest, dearest
girl--how can I dare to call you so? Let me, therefore, rush for comfort
into other thoughts; and tell you at once of the fearful dangers we have
now mercifully escaped; for the Samarang lies like a log in this
friendly port, dismasted, and next to a wreck.

"I proceed to show you about it; perhaps I shall be tedious--but I do it
as a little rest, my own soul's love, from anxious, earnest,
heart-distracting prayers continually, continually, that the sorrow
which I spoke of be not true. Sometimes, a light breaks in, and I
rejoice in the most sanguine hope: at others, gloom--

"But a truce to all this, I say. Here shall follow didactically the
cause why the good ship Samarang is not by this time in the Docks.

"We were lying somewhere about the tropical belt, Capricorn you know,
(O, those tender lessons in geography, my Emmy!) quite becalmed; the sea
like glass, and the sky like brass, and the air in a most stagnant heat:
our good ship motionless, dead in a dead blue sea it was

'Idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean.'

"The sails were hanging loosely in the shrouds: every one set, from
sky-scraper to stud-sail, in hopes to catch a breath of wind. My
fellow-passengers and the crew, almost melted, were lying about, as weak
as parboiled eels: it was high-noon, all things silent and subdued by
that intolerable blaze; for the vertical sun, over our multiplied
awnings and umbrellas, burnt us up, fierce as a furnace.

"I was leaning over the gangway, looking wistfully at the cool, clear,
deep sea, wherefrom the sailors were trying to persuade a shark to come
on board us, when, all at once, in the south-east quarter, I noticed a
little round black cloud, thrown up from the horizon like a
cricket-ball. As any thing is attractive in such sameness as perpetual
sea and sky, my discovery was soon made known, and among the first to
our captain.

"Calling for his Dolland, and bidding his second lieutenant run quick to
the cabin and look at the barometer, he viewed the little cloud in
evident anxiety, and shook his head with a solemn air: more than one
light-hearted woman thinking he was quizzing them.

"Up came Lieutenant Joyce, looking as if he had seen a ghost in the
cabin.

"'The mercury, sir, is falling just as rapidly as it would rise if you
plunged it into boiling water: an inch a minute or so!"

"Our captain saw the danger instantly, and, brave as Trueman is, I never
saw a man look paler.

"To drive all the passengers below, and pen them in with closed hatches
and storm-shutters, (so hot, Emmy, that the black-hole of Calcutta must
have been an ice-house to it: how the foolish people abused our wise
skipper, and more than one pompous old Indian threatened him with an
action for false imprisonment!) this huddling away was the first effort;
and simultaneously with it, the crew were all over the rigging, furling
sails, hurriedly, hurriedly.

"Meanwhile (for I was last on deck), that little cloud seemed whirling
within itself, and many others gathered round it, all dancing about on
the horizon, as if sheaves of mischief tossed about by devils: I don't
wish to be poetical, Emmy, for my heart is very, very sad; but if ever
the powers of the air sow the wind and reap the whirlwind, they were
gathering in their harvest at that door. Underneath the skipping clouds,
which came on quickly, leaping over each other, as when the wain is
loaded by a score of hands, I noticed a sea approaching, such as Pharaoh
must have seen, when the wall of waters fell upon him; and premonitory
winds came whistling by, and two or three sails were flapping in them
still, and I was hurried down stairs after all the rest of us.

"Then, on a sudden, it appeared not winds, nor waves, nor thunder, but
as if the squadroned cavalry of heaven had charged across the seas, and
crushed our battered ship beneath their horse-hoofs! We were flung down
flat on our beam ends; and the two or three unfurled sails, bursting
with the noise of a cannon, were scattered miles away to lee-ward as if
they had been paper. As for the poor fellows in the rigging, the spirit
of the storm had already made them his: twenty of our men were swept
away by that tornado.

"Then there was hewing and cleaving on deck, the clatter of many axes
and hatchets: for we were in imminent danger of being capsized, keel
uppermost, and our only chance was to cut away the masts.

"The muscles of courage were tried then, my Emmy, and the strength which
religion gives a man. I felt sensibly held up by the Everlasting Arms: I
could listen to the still small Voice in the midst of a crash which
might have been the end of all things: though in darkness, God had given
me light; though in uttermost peril, my peace was never calmer in our
little village school.

"And the billows were knocking at the poor ship's side like sledge
hammers; and the lightnings fell around us scorchingly, with forked
bolts, as arrows from the hand of a giant; the thunders overhead, close
overhead, crashing from a concave cloud that hung about us heavily--a
dense, black, suffocating curtain--roared and raved as nothing earthly
can, but thunder in the tropics; the rain was as a cataract, literally
rushing in a mass: the winds appeared not winds, nor whirlwinds, but
legions of emancipated demons shrieking horribly, and flapping their
wide wings; a flock of night-birds flying from the dawn; and all else
was darkness, confusion, rolling and rocking about, the screams of
women, the shouts of men, curses and prayers, agony, despair,
and--peace, deep peace.

"On a sudden, to our great astonishment, all was silent again,
oppressively silent; and, but for the swell upon the seas, all still.
The tornado had rushed by: that troop of Tartar horse, having sacked the
village, are departed, now in full retreat: the blackness and the fury
are beheld on our lee, hastening across the broad Atlantic to Cuba or
Jamaica: and behold, a tranquil temperate sky, a kindly rolling sea, a
favouring breeze, and--not a sail, but some slight jury-rig, to catch
it.

"Many days we drifted like a log upon the wave; provisions running
short, and water--water under tropical suns--scantily dealt out in
tea-cups. Then, poor old Mackie's health gave way; and I dreaded for her
death: one living witness is worth a cart-load of cold documents. So I
nursed and watched her constantly: till the foolish folks on board began
to say I was her son: ah! me, for your sake I wish it had been so.

"And at length, just as some among the sailors were hinting at a mutiny
for spirits, and our last case of Gamble's meat was opened for the sick,
our look-out on the jury-mast gave the welcome note of 'Land!' and soon,
to us on deck, the heights of St. Helena rose above the sea. Towed in by
friendly aid, here we are, then, precious Emily, refitting: and, as it
must be a week yet before we can be ready, I have taken my old woman to
a lodging upon land, and rejoice (what have I to do with joy?) to see
her speedily recovering."

The remainder of Charles's long letter is so stupid, so gloomy, so
loving, and so little to the purpose, that I take an editor's privilege,
and omit it altogether. Of course he was coming home again, as soon as
the Samarang and Jeanie Mackie would permit.




CHAPTER XXV.

TRIALS.


THE general recovered; as slowly, indeed, as Emily had, but it is
gratifying to add, as surely. And now that loving couple might be seen,
weakly creeping out together, when the day was finest: tottering white
December leaning on a sickly fragile May. There were no concealments now
between them, no reservings, and heart-stricken Emily heard from her
repentant father's lips the story of her birth: she was, he said, his
own daughter by a native princess, the Begum Dowlia Burruckjutli.

A bitter--bitter truth was that: the destruction of all her hopes,
pleasures, and affections. It had now become to her a sin to love that
dearest one of all things lovely on this earth: duty, paramount and
stern, commanded her, without a shadow of reprieve, to execute on
herself immediately the terrible sentence of banishing her own
betrothed: nay, more, she must forget him, erase his precious image from
her heart, and never, never see that brother more. And Charles must feel
the same, and do the like; oh! sorrow, passing words! and their two
commingled souls must be violently wrenched apart; for such love in them
were crime.

Dear children of affection--it is a dreadful lesson this for both of
you; but most wise, most needful--or the hand that guideth all things,
never would have sent it. Know ye not for comfort, that ye are of those
to whom all things work together for good? Know ye not for counsel, that
the excess of love is an idolatry that must be blighted? It is well,
children, it is well, that ye should thus carry your wounded hearts for
balm to the altar of God; it is well that ye should bow in meekness to
His will, in readiness to His wisdom. Ye are learning the lesson
speedily, as docile children should; and be assured of high reward from
the Teacher who hath set it you. Poor Charles! white and wan, thy cheek
is grown transparent with anxiety, and thy blue eye dim with hope
deferred: poor Emmy, sick and weak, thou weariest Heaven with thy
prayers, and waterest thy couch with thy tears. Yet, a little while;
this discipline is good: storm and wind, frost and rushing rains, are as
needful to the forest-tree as sun and gentle shower; the root is
strengthening, and its fibres spreading out: and loving still each other
with the best of human love, ye justly now have found out how to anchor
all your strongest hopes, and deepest thoughts, on Him who made you for
himself. Who knoweth? wisely acquiescing in His will, humbly trusting to
His mercy, and bringing the holocaust of your inflamed affections as an
offering of duty to your God--who knoweth? Cannot He interpose? will He
not befriend you? For His arm is power, and His heart is love.

Days rolled on in dull monotony, and grew to weeks more slowly than
before; earthly hopes had been levelled with the dust; life had
forgotten to be joyous: there was, indeed, the calm, the peace, the
resignation, the heavenly ante-past, and the soul-entrancing prayer; but
human life to Emily was flat, wearisome, and void; she felt like a nun,
immolated as to this world: even as Charles, too, had resolved to be an
anchorite, a stern, hard, mortified man, who once had feelings and
affections. The rëaction in both those fond young hearts had even
overstept the golden mean: and Mercy interposed to make all right, and
to bless them in each other once again.

Only look at this _billet-doux_ from Charles, just come in, and dated
Plymouth:

"Huzzah--for Emily and England: huzzah for the land of freedom! no
secrets now--dear, dear old Jeanie Mackie has given me proofs positive:
all I have to wish is that she could move: but she is very ill; so, as
we touched here on the voyage up channel, I landed her and myself,
thinking to kiss, within a day, my darling Emmy. But I cannot get her
out of bed this morning, and dare not leave her: though an hour's delay
seems almost insupportable. If I possibly can manage it, I will bring
the dear old faithful creature, wrapped in blankets, by chaise
to-morrow. Tell my father all this: and say to him--he will understand,
perhaps, though you may not, my blessed girl--say to him, that 'he is
mistaken, and all are mistaken--you are not what they think you.' A
thousand kisses. Expect, then, on bright to-morrow to see your happy,
happy
                                                         "CHARLES."

"P.S. Hip! hip! hip!--huzzah!"

Dearest Emily had taken up the note with fears and trembling: she laid
it down, as they that reap in joy; and I never in my life saw any thing
so beautiful as her eyes at that glad minute; the smile through the
tear, the light through the gloom, the verdure of high summer springing
through the Alpine snows, the mild and lustrous moon emerging from a
baffled thunder-cloud.

And, although the general mournfully shook his head, distrustfully and
despondingly; though he only uttered, "Poor children--dear
children--would to Heaven that it could be so;"--and he, for one, was
evidently innoculated, as before, with all the old thoughts of gloom,
sadness, and anxiety;--still Emily hoped--for Charles hoped--and Jeanie
Mackie was so certain.




CHAPTER XXVI.

JULIAN.


NEXT day, a fine summer afternoon, when our feeble convalescents had
gone out together, they found the fresh air so invigorating, and
themselves so much stronger, that they prolonged their walk half-way to
Oxton. The pasture-meadows, rich and rank, were alive with flocks and
herds; the blue sea lazily beat time, as, ticking out the seconds, it
melodiously broke upon the sleeping shore; the darkly-flowing Mullet
swept sounding to the sea between its tortuous banks; and upon that old
high foot-path skirting the stream, now shady with hazels, and now
flowery with meadow-sweet, crept our chastened pair.

Just as they were nearing a short angle in the river, the spot where
Charles had been preserved, they noticed for the first time a
rough-looking fisherman, who, unseen, had tracked their steps some
hundred yards; he had a tarpaulin over his shoulder, very unnecessarily,
as it would seem, on so fine and warm a day; and a slouching
sou'-wester, worn askew, flapped across the strange man's face.

He came on quickly, though cautiously, looking right and left; and Emily
trembled on her guardian's feeble arm. Yes--she is right; the fisherman
approaches--she detects him through it all: and now he scorns disguise;
flinging off his cap and the tarpaulin, stands before them--Julian!

"So, sir--you tremble now, do you, gallant general: give me the girl."
And he levelled at his father one of those double-barrelled pistols,
full-cock.

"Julian, my son, I forgive you, Julian; take my hand, boy."

"What--coward? now you can cringe, and fawn, eh? back with you!--the
girl, I say." For poor Emily, wild with fear, was clinging to that weak
old man.

Julian levelled again; indeed, indeed it was only as a threat;
but his hand shook with passion--the weapon was full-cock,
hair-triggered--shotted heavily as always--hark, hark!--And his father
fell upon the turf, covered with blood!

When a wicked man tampers with unintended crime, even accident falls out
against him. Many a one has richly merited death for many other sins,
than that isolated, haply accidental one which he has hanged for.

Julian, horror-stricken, pale and trembling, flew instinctively to help
his father: but Emily has circled him already with her arms; and listen,
Julian--your dying father speaks to you.

"Boy, I forgive--I forgive: but--Emily, no, no, cannot, cannot
be--Julian--she--she is your _sister_!" and the old man swooned away,
from loss of blood and the excitement of that awful scene.

Not a word in reply said that poor sinner, maddened with his life-long
crimes, the fratricide in will, the parricide in deed, and all for--a
sister. But growing whiter as he stood, a marble man with bristling
hair, he slowly drew the other pistol from his pocket, put the muzzle to
his mouth, and, firing as he fell, leapt into the darkly-flowing Mullet!

The current, all too violent to sink in, and uncommissioned now to
save, hurried its black burden to the sea; and a crimson streak of gore
marked the track of the suicide.

The old man was not dead; but a brace of bullets taking effect upon his
feeble frame--one through the shoulder, and another which had grazed his
head--had been quite enough to make him seem so. Forgetful of all but
that dear sufferer, and totally ignorant of Julian's fate--for she
neither saw nor heard any thing, nor feared even for her own imminent
peril, while her father lay dying on the grass--Emily had torn off her
scarf, and bound up, as well as she could, the ghastly scored head and
broken shoulder. She succeeded in staunching the blood--for no great
vessel had been severed--and so simple an application as grass dipped in
water, proved to be a good specific. Then, to her exceeding joy, those
eyes opened again, and that dear tongue faintly whispered--"Bless you."

Oh, that blessing! for it fell upon her heart: and fervently she knelt
down there, and thanked the Great Preserver.

And now, for friendly help; there is no one near: and it is growing
dusk; and she dared not leave him there alone one minute--for
Julian--dreaded Julian, may return, and kill him. What shall she do? How
to get him home? Alas, alas! he may die where he is lying.

Hark, Emmy, hark! The shouts of happy children bursting out of school!
See, dearest--see: here they come homewards merrily from Oxton.

Thus, rewarded through the instrumentality of her own benevolence, help
was speedily obtained; and Mrs. Sainsbury's invalid-chair, hurried to
the spot by an escort of indignant rustics, soon conveyed the recovering
patient to the comforts of his own home, and the appliances of medical
assistance.




CHAPTER XXVII.

CHARLES'S RETURN; AND MRS. MACKIE'S EXPLANATION.


AND now the happy day was come at length; that day formerly so
hoped-for, latterly so feared, but last of all, hailed with the joy that
trembles at its own intensity. The very morning after the sad occurrence
it has just been my lot to chronicle--while the general was having his
wounds dressed, slight ones, happily, but still he was not safe, as
inflammation might ensue--while Mrs. Tracy was indulging in her third
tumbler, mixed to whet her appetite for shrimps--and while Emily was
deciphering, for the forty thousandth time, Charles's sanguine
_billet-doux_--lo! a dusty chaise and smoking posters, and a sun-burnt
young fellow springing out, and just upon the stairs--they were locked
in each other's arms!

Oh, the rapture of that instant! it can but happen once within a life.
Ye that have loved, remember such a meeting; and ye that never loved,
conceive it if you can; for my pen hath little skill to paint so bright
a pleasure. It is to be all heart, all pulse, all sympathy, all
spirit--but the warm soft kiss, that rarified bloom of the Material.

How the sick old nurse got out, cased in many blankets; how she was
bundled up stairs, and deposited safely on a sofa, no poet is alive to
sing: to those who would record the payment of postillions, let me leave
so sweet a theme.

The first fond greeting over, and those tumults of affection sobered
down, Charles rejoiced to find how lovingly the general met him; the
kind and good old man fell upon his neck, as the father in the parable.
Many things were then to be made known: and many questions answered, as
best might be, about a mother and a brother; but well aware of all
things ourselves, let us be satisfied that Charles heard in due time all
they had to tell him; though neither Emily nor the general could explain
what had become of Julian after that terrible encounter. In their
belief, he had fled for very life, thinking he had killed his father.
Poor wretched man, thought Charles--on that same spot, too, where he
would have murdered me! And for his mother--why came she not down
eagerly and happily, as mothers ever do, to greet her long-lost son? Do
not ask, Charles; do not press the question. Think her ill, dying,
dead--any thing but--drunken. He ran to her room-door; but it was
locked--luckily.

Now, Charles--now speedily to business; happy business that, if I may
trust the lover's flushing cheek, and Emily's radiant eyes; but a
mournful one too, and a fearful, if I turn my glance to that poor old
man, wounded in body and stricken in mind--who waits to hear, in more
despondency than hope, what he knows to be the bitter truth--the truth
that must be told, to the misery of those dear children.

Faint and weak though she appeared, Jeanie Mackie's waning life
spirited up for the occasion; her dim eye kindled; her feeble frame was
straight and strong; energy nerved her as she spoke; this hour is the
errand of her being.

Long she spoke, and loudly, in her broad Scotch way; and the general
objected many things, but was answered to them all; and there was close
cross-questioning, slow-caution, keen examination of documents and
letters: catechisms, solecisms, Scottisms; reminiscences rubbed up,
mistakes corrected; and the grand result of all, Emily a Stuart, and the
general not her father! I am only enabled to give a brief account of
that important colloquy.

It appears, that when Captain Tracy's company was quartered to the west
of the Gwalior, sent thither to guard the Begum Dowlia against sundry of
her disaffected subjects, a certain Lieutenant James Stuart was one
among those welcome brave allies. That our gallant Tracy was the
beautiful Begum's favourite soon became notorious to all; and not less
so, that the Begum herself was precisely in the same interesting
situation as Mrs. James Stuart. The two ladies, Pagan and Christian,
were, technically speaking, running a race together. Well, just as times
drew nigh, poor Lieutenant Stuart was unfortunately killed in an
insurrection headed by some fanatics, who disapproved of foreign
friends, and perhaps of their princess's situation. His death proved
fatal also to that kind and faithful wife of his--a dark Italian lady of
high family, whose love for James had led her to follow him even into
Central Hindoostan: she died in giving birth to a babe; and Jeanie
Mackie, the lieutenant's own foster-mother, who waited on his wife
through all their travels, assisted the poor orphan into this bleak
world, and loved it as her own.

Two days after all this, the Begum herself had need of Mrs. Mackie: for
it was prudent to conceal some things, if she could, from certain
Brahmins, who were to her what John Knox had erstwhile been to Mary: and
Jeanie Mackie, burdened with her little Amy Stuart, aided in the birth
of a female Tracy-Begum. So, the nurse tended both babes; and more than
once had marvelled at their general resemblance; Amy's mother looked out
again from those dark eyes; there was not a shade between the children.

Now, Mrs. Mackie perceived, in a very little while, how fond both
Christian and Pagan appeared of their own child; and how little notice
was taken by any body of the poor Scotch gentleman's orphan.
Accordingly, with a view to give her favourite all worldly advantages,
she adroitly changed the children; and, while she was still kind and
motherly to the little Tracy-Begum, she had the satisfaction to see her
pet supposititiously brought up in all the splendours of an Eastern
court.

Years wore away, for Captain Tracy was quite happy, the Begum being a
fine showy woman, and the pretty child his playmate and pastime: so he
never cared to stir from his rich quarters, till the company's orders
forced him: and then Puttymuddyfudgepoor hailed him accumulatively both
major and colonel.

When he found that he must go, he insisted on carrying off the child;
and the Begum was as resolute against it. Then Mrs. Mackie, eager to
expedite little Stuart in her escape, went to the princess, told her how
that, in anticipation of this day, she had changed the children, and got
great rewards for thus restoring to the mother her own offspring.

The remainder of that old Scotch nurse's very prosy tale may be left to
be imagined: for all that was essential has been stated: and the
documents in proof of all were these--

First: The marriage certificates of James Stuart and Ami di Romagna,
duly attested, both in the Protestant and Romanist forms.

Secondly: Divers letters to Lieutenant Stewart from his friends at
Glenmuir; others to Mrs. Stuart, from her father, the old Marquis di
Romagna, at Naples: several trinkets, locks of hair, the wedding-ring,
&c.

Thirdly: A grant written in the Hindoostanee character, from the Begum
Dowlia, promising the pension of thirty rupees a month to Jeanie Mackie,
for having so cleverly preserved to her the child: together with a
regular judicial acknowledgement, both from several of Tracy's own
sepoys, and from the Begum herself, that the girl, whom Captain Tracy
was so fond of, was, to the best of their belief, Amy Stuart.

Fourthly: A miniature of Mrs. James Stuart, exactly portraying the
features of her daughter--this bright, beautiful, dark-eyed face--our
own beloved Emily Warren.

And to all that accumulated evidence, Jeanie Mackie bore her living
testimony; clearly, unhesitatingly, and well assured, in the face of God
and man.

Doubt was at an end; fear was at an end; hope was come, and joy. Happy
were the lovers, happy Jeanie Mackie, but happiest of all appeared the
general himself. For now she might be his daughter indeed, sweet Emmy
Tracy still, dear Charles's loving wife. And he blessed them as they
knelt, and gave them to each other; well-rewarded children of affection,
who had prayed in their distress!




CHAPTER XXVIII.

JULIAN TURNS UP: AND THERE'S AN END OF MRS. TRACY.


THERE is a muddy sort of sand-bank, acting as a delta to the Mullet,
just where it spreads from deep to shallow, and falls into the sea.
Strange wild fowl abound there, coming from the upper clouds in flocks;
and at high water, very little else but rushes can be seen, to testify
its sub-marine existence.

A knot of fishermen, idling on the beach, have noticed an uncommon
flight of Royston crows gathered at the island, with the object, as it
would appear, of battening on a dead porpoise, or some such body, just
discernible among the rushes. Stop--that black heap may be kegs of
whiskey;--where's the glass?

Every one looked: it warn't barrels--and it warn't a porpoise: what was
it, then? they had universally nothing on earth to do, so they pushed
off in company to see.

I watched the party off, and they poked among the rushes, and heaved out
what seemed to me a seal: so I ran down to the beach to look at the
strange creature they had captured. Something wrapped in a sail; no
doubt for exhibition at per head.

But they brought out that black burden solemnly, laying it on the beach
at Burleigh: a crowd quickly collected round them, that I could not see
the creature: and some ran for a magistrate, and some for a parson. Then
men in office came--made a way through the crowd, and I got near: so
near, that my foolish curiosity lifted up the sail, and I beheld--what
had been Julian.

O, sickening sight: for all which the pistol had spared of that swart
and hairy face, had been preyed upon by birds and fishes!

There was a hurried inquest: the poor general and Emily deposed to what
they knew, and the rustics, who escorted him from Oxton. The verdict
could be only one--self-murder.

So, by night, on that same swampy island, when the tide was low, they
buried him, deeply staked into the soil, lest the waves should disinter
him, without a parting prayer. Such is the end of the wicked.

In a day or two, I noticed that a rude wooden cross had been set over
the spot: and it gratified me much to hear that a rough-looking crew of
smugglers had boldly come and fixed it there, to hallow, if they could,
a comrade's grave.

However, these poor fellows had been cheated hours before: Charles's
brotherly care had secured the poor remains, and the vicar winked a
blind permission: so Charles buried them by night in the church-yard
corner, under the yew, reading many prayers above them.

Two fierce-looking strange men went to that burial with reverent looks,
as it were chief mourners; and when all the rites were done, I heard
them gruffly say to Charles, "God bless you, sir, for this!"

When the mother heard those tidings of her son, she was sobered on the
instant, and ran about the house with all a mother's grief, shrieking
like a mad woman. But all her shrieks and tears could not bring back
poor Julian; deep, deep in the silent grave, she cannot wake him--cannot
kiss him now. Ah well! ah well!

Then did she return to his dear room, desperate for him--and Hollands
once, twice, thrice, she poured out a full tumbler of the burning fluid,
and drank it off like water; and it maddened her brain: her mind was in
a phrensy of delirium, while her body shook as with a palsy.

Let us draw the curtain; for she died that night.

They buried her in Aunt Green's grave: what a meeting theirs will be at
the day of resurrection!




CHAPTER XXIX.

THE OLD SCOTCH NURSE GOES HOME.


SIX months at least--this is clearly not a story of the unities--six
months' interval must now elapse before the wedding-day. Charles and
Emmy--for he called her Emmy still, though Jeanie Mackie would persist
in mouthing it to "Aamy,"--wished to have it delayed a year, in respect
for the memory of those who, with all their crime and folly, were not
the less a mother and a brother: but the general would not hear of such
a thing; he was growing very old, he said; although actually he seemed
to have taken out a new lease of life, so young again and buoyant was
the new-found heart within him; and thus growing old, he was full of
fatherly fear that he should not live to see his children's happiness.
It was only reasonable and proper that our pair of cooing doves should
acquiesce in his desire.

Meanwhile, I am truly sorry to say it, Jeanie Mackie died; for it would
have been a good novel-like incident to have suffered the faithful old
creature to have witnessed her favourite's wedding, and then to have
been forthwith killed out of the way, by--perishing in the vestry.
However, things were ordered otherwise, and Jeanie Mackie did not live
to see the wedding: if you wish to know how and where she died, let me
tell you at once.

Scotland--Argyleshire--Glenmuir; this was the focus of her hopes and
thoughts--that poor old Indian exile! She had left it, as a buxom
bright-haired lassie: but oaks had now grown old that she had planted
acorns; and grandmothers had died palsied, whom she remembered born;
still, around the mountains and the lakes, those changeless features of
her girlhood's rugged home, the old woman's memory wandered; they were
pictured in her mind's eye hard, and clear, and definite as if she
looked upon them now. And her soul's deep hope was to see them once
again.

There was yet another object which made her yearn for Scotland.
Lieutenant Stuart had been the younger of two brothers, the eldest born
of whom became, upon his father's, the old laird's, death, Glenmuir and
Glenmurdock. Now, though twice married, this elder brother, the new
laird, never had a child; and the clear consequence was, that Amy Stuart
was likely to become sole heiress of her ancestor's possessions. The
lieutenant's marriage with an Italian and a Romanist had been,
doubtless, any thing but pleasant to his friends; the strict old
Presbyterians, and the proud unsullied family of Stuart, could not
palate it at all. Nevertheless, he did marry the girl, according to the
rites of both churches, and there was an end of it; so, innumerable
proverbs coming to their aid about "curing and enduring" and "must
be's," and the place where "marriages are made," &c., the several aunts
and cousins were persuaded at length to wink at the iniquity, and to
correspond both with Mrs. James and her backsliding lieutenant. Of the
offspring of that marriage, and her orphaned state, and of Mrs. Mackie's
care, and the indefinite detention in central Hindostan, they had heard
often-times; for, as there is no corner of the world where a Scot may
not be met with, so, with laudable nationality, they all hang together;
and Glenmuir was written to frequently, all about the child, through
Jeanie Mackie, "her mark," and a scholarly sergeant, Duncan Blair.

Amy's rights--or Emmy let us call her still, as Charles did--were now,
therefore, the next object of Mrs. Mackie's zeal; and all parties
interested willingly listened to the plan of spending one or two of
those weary weeks in rubbing up relationships in Scotland; the general
also was not a little anxious about heritage and acres. Accordingly, off
they set in the new travelling-carriage, with due notice of approach,
heartily welcomed, to Dunstowr Castle, the fine old feudal stronghold of
Robert Stuart, Laird of Glenmuir and Glenmurdock.

The journey, the arrival, and the hearty hospitality; and how the gray
old chieftain kissed his pretty niece; and how welcome her betrothed
Charles and her kind life-long guardian, and her faithful nurse were
made; and how the beacons blazed upon the hill-tops, and the mustering
clan gathered round about old Dunstowr; and how the laird presented to
them all their beautiful future mistress, and how Jeanie Mackie and her
documents travelled up to Edinburgh, where writers to the signet
pestered her heart-sick with over-caution; and how the case was all
cleared up, and the distant disappointed cousin, who had irrationally
hoped to be the heir, was gladdened, if not satisfied, with a pension
and a cantle of Glenmuir; and how all was joyfulness and feasting, when
Amy Stuart was acknowledged in her rights--the bagpipes and the wassail,
salmon, and deer, and black-cock, with a river of mountain dew: let
others tell who know Dunstowr; for as I never was there, of course I
cannot faithfully describe it. Should such an historian as I condescend
to sheer inventions?

With respect to Jeanie Mackie, I could learn no more than this: she was
sprightly and lively, and strong as ever, though in her ninetieth year,
till her foster-child was righted, and the lawyers had allowed her her
claim. But then there seemed nothing else to live for; so her life
gradually faded from her eye, as an expiring candle; and she would doze
by the hour, sitting on a settle in the sun, basking her old heart in
the smile of those old mountains. None knew when she died, to a minute;
for she died sitting in the sun, in the smile of those old mountains.

They buried her, with much of rustic pomp, in the hill-church of
Glenmuir, where all her fathers slept around her; and Emily and Charles,
hand-in-hand, walked behind her coffin mournfully.




CHAPTER XXX.

FINAL.


GLADLY would the laird have had marriage at Dunstower, and have given
away the beauteous bride himself: but there must still be two months
more of decent mourning, and the general had long learned to sigh for
the maligned delights of Burleigh Singleton. So, Glenmuir could only get
a promise of reappearance some fine summer or other: and, after another
day's deer-stalking, which made the general repudiate telescopes from
that day forth (the poor man's eyes had actually grown lobster-like with
straining after antlers)--the travelling-carriage, and four lean kine
from Inverary, whisked away the trio towards the South.

And now, in due time, were the Tamworths full of joy--congratulating,
sympathizing, merrymaking; and the three young ladies behaved admirably
in the capacity of pink and silver bridesmaids; while George proved
equally kind in attending (as he called it) Charles's "execution,"
wherein he was "turned off;" and the admiral, G.C.B. was so
hand-in-glove with the general, H.E.I.C.S., that I have reason to
believe they must have sworn eternal friendship, after the manner of the
modern Germans.

How beautiful our Emmy looked--I hate the broad Scotch Aamy--how bright
her flashing eyes, and how fragrantly the orange-blossoms clustered in
her rich brown hair; let him speak lengthily, whose province it may be
to spin three volumes out of one: for me, I always wish to recollect
that readers possess, on the average, at least as much imagination as
writers. And why should you not exercise it now? Is not Emmy in her
bridal-dress a theme well worth a revery?

For a similar reason, I must clearly disappoint feminine expectation, by
forbearing to descant upon Charles's slight but manly form, and his
Grecian beauty, &c., all the better for the tropics, and the trials and
the troubles he had passed.

When Captain Forbes, just sitting down to his soup in the Jamaica
Coffee-house, read in the _Morning Post_, the marriage of Charles Tracy
with Amy Stuart, he delivered himself mentally as follows:

"There now! Poets talk of 'love,' and I stick to 'human nature.' When
that fine young fellow sailed with me, hardly a year ago, in the Sir
William Elphinston, he was over head and heels in love with old Jack
Tracy's pretty girl, Emily Warren: but I knew it wouldn't last long: I
don't believe in constancy for longer than a week. It does one's heart
good to see how right one is; here's what I call proof. My sentimental
spark kisses Emily Warren, and marries Amy Stuart." The captain, happier
than before, called complacently for Cayenne pepper, and relished his
mock-turtle with a higher gusto.

It is worth recording, that the same change of name mystified slanderous
friends in the Presidency of Madras.

And now, kind-eyed reader, this story of '_The Twins_' must leave off
abruptly at the wedding. As in its companion-tale, '_The Crock of
Gold_,' one grand thesis for our thoughts was that holy wise command,
"Thou shall not covet," and as its other comrade '_Heart_' is founded on
"Thou shalt not bear false witness," so in this, the seed-corn of the
crop, were five pure words, "Thou shalt not commit adultery." Other
morals doubtless grew up round us, for all virtue hangs together in a
bunch: the harms of secresy, false witness, inordinate affections, and
red murder: but in chief, as we have said.

Moreover, I wish distinctly to make known, for dear "domestic" sake,
that so far from our lovers' happiness having been consummated (that is,
finished) in the honey-moon--it was only then begun. How long they are
to live thus happily together, Heaven, who wills all things good, alone
can tell; I wish them three score years. Little ones, I hear, arrive
annually--to the unqualified joy, not merely of papa and mamma, but also
of our communicative old general, his friend the G.C.B., and (all but
most of any) the Laird of Glenmuir and Glenmurdock, whose heart has been
entirely rejoiced by Charles Tracy having added to his name, and to his
children's names, that of Stuart.

Mr. and Mrs. Tracy Stuart are often at Glenmuir; but oftener at
Burleigh, where the general, I fancy, still resides. He protests that he
never will keep a secret again: long may he live to say so!


                            END OF THE TWINS.