The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866

Reuben turns to Adèle. "Adèle, kiss me!" A rosy tint ran over her face as she stooped and kissed him with a freedom a mother might have shown,—leaving one hand toying caressingly with his hair. "The cloud is passing, Adèle,—passing! God is Justice; Christ is Mercy. In him I trust."

"Reuben, darling," says Adèle, "come back to us!"

"Darling,—darling!" he repeated with a strange, eager, satisfied smile,—so sweet a sound it was.

The chamber was filled with the delightful perfume of a violet bed beneath the window. Suddenly there came from the Doctor, whose old eyes caught sooner than any the change, a passionate outcry. "Great God! Thy will be done!"

With that one loud, clear utterance, his firmness gave way,—for the first time in sixty years broke utterly; and big tears streamed down his face as he gazed yearningly upon the dead body of his first-born.

LXVII

In the autumn of 1845, three years after the incidents related in our last chapter, Mr. Philip Elderkin, being at that time president of a railroad company, which was establishing an important connection of travel that was to pass within a few miles of the quiet town of Ashfield, was a passenger on the steamer Caledonia, for Europe. He sailed, partly in the interest of the company,—to place certain bonds,—and partly in his own interest, as an intelligent man, eager to add to his knowledge of the world.

At Paris, where he passed some time, it chanced that he was one evening invited to the house of a resident American, where, he was gayly assured, he would meet with a very attractive American heiress, the only daughter of a merchant of large fortune.

Philip Elderkin—brave, straightforward fellow that he was—had never forgotten his early sentiment. He had cared for those French graves in Ashfield with an almost religious attention. In all the churchyard there was not such scrupulously shorn turf, or such orderly array of bloom. He counted—in a fever of doubt—upon a visit to Marseilles before his sail for home.

But at the soirée we have mentioned he was amazed and delighted to meet, in the person of the heiress, Adèle Maverick,—not changed essentially since the time he had known her. That life at Marseilles—even in the well-appointed home of her father—has none of that domesticity which she had learned to love; and this first winter in Paris for her does not supply the lack. That she has a great company of admirers it is easy to understand; but yet she gives a most cordial greeting to Phil Elderkin,—a greeting that by its manner makes the pretenders doubtful. Philip finds it possible to reconcile the demands of his business with a week's visit to Marseilles. To the general traveller it is not a charming region. The dust abounds; the winds are terrible; the sun is scalding. But Mr. Philip Elderkin found it delightful. And, indeed, the country-house of Mr. Maverick had attractions of its own; attractions so great that his week runs over into two,—into three. There are excursions to the Pont du Gard, to the Arène of Arles. And, before he leaves, he has an engagement there (which he has enforced by very peremptory proposals) for the next spring.

On his return to Ashfield, he reports a very successful trip. To his sister Rose (now Mrs. Catesby, with a blooming little infant, called Grace Catesby) he is specially communicative. And she thinks it was a glorious trip, and longs for the time when he will make the next. He, furthermore, to the astonishment of Dame Tourtelot (whose husband sleeps now under the sod), has commenced the establishment of a fine home, upon a charming site, overlooking all Ashfield. The Squire, still stalwart, cannot resist giving a hint of what is expected to the old Doctor, who still wearily goes his rounds, and prays for the welfare of his flock.

He is delighted at the thought of meeting again with Adèle, though he thinks with a sigh of his lost boy. Yet he says in his old manner, "'T is the hand of Providence; she first bloomed into grace under the roof of our church; she comes back to adorn it with her faith and her works."

At a date three years later we take one more glimpse at that quiet village of Ashfield, where we began our story. The near railway has brought it into more intimate connection with the shore towns and the great cities. But there is no noisy clatter of the cars to break the quietude. On still days, indeed, the shriek of the steam-whistle or the roar of a distant train is heard bursting over the hills, and dying in strange echoes up and down the valley. The stage-driver's horn is heard no longer; no longer the coach whirls into the village and delivers its leathern pouch of letters. The Tew partners we once met are now partners in the grave. Deacon Tourtelot (as we have already hinted) has gone to his long home; and the dame has planted over him the slab of "Varmont" marble, which she has bought at a bargain from his "nevvy."

The Boody tavern-keeper has long since disappeared; no teams wheel up with the old dash at the doors of the Eagle Tavern. The creaking sign-board even is gone from the overhanging sycamore.

Miss Almira is still among the living. She sings treble, however, no longer; she wears spectacles; she writes no more over mystical asterisks for the Hartford Courant. Age has brought to her at least this much of wisdom.

The mill groans, as of old, in the valley. A new race of boys pelt the hanging nests of the orioles; a new race of school-girls hang swinging on the village gates at the noonings.

As for Miss Johns, she lives still,—scarce older to appearance than twenty years before,—prim, wiry, active,—proof against all ailments, it would seem. It is hard to conceive of her as yielding to the great conqueror. If the tongue and an inflexibility of temper were the weapons, she would whip Death from her chamber at the last. It seems like amiability almost to hear such a one as she talk of her approaching, inevitable dissolution,—so kindly in her to yield that point!

And she does; she declares it over and over, there are far feebler ones who do not declare it half so often. If she is to be conquered and the Johns banner go down, she will accept the defeat so courageously and so long in advance that the defeat shall become a victorious confirmation of the Johns prophecy.

She is still earnest in all her duties; she gives cast-away clothing to the poor, and good advice with it. She is rigorous in the observance of every propriety; no storm keeps her from church. If the children of a new generation climb unduly upon the pew-backs, or shake their curly heads too wantonly, she lifts a prim forefinger at them, which has lost none of its authoritative meaning. She is the impersonation of all good severities. A strange character! Let us hope that, as it sloughs off its earthly cerements, it may in the Divine presence scintillate charities and draw toward it the love of others. A good, kind, bad gentlewoman,—unwearied in performance of duties. We wonder as we think of her! So steadfast, we cannot sneer at her,—so true to her line of faith, we cannot condemn her,—so utterly forbidding, we cannot love her! May God give rest to her good, stubborn soul!

Upon Sundays of August and September there may be occasionally seen in the pew of Elderkin Junior a gray-haired old gentleman, dressed with scrupulous care, and still carrying an erect figure, though somewhat gouty in his step. This should be Mr. Maverick, a retired merchant, who is on a visit to his daughter. He makes wonderful gifts to a certain little boy who bears a Puritan name, and gives occasional ponderous sums to the parish. In winter, his head-quarters are at the Union Club.

And Doctor Johns? Yes, he is living still,—making his way wearily each morning along the street with his cane. Going oftenest, perhaps, to the home of Adèle, who is now a matron,—a tender, and most womanly and joyful matron,—and with her little boy—Reuben Elderkin by name—he wanders often to the graves where sleep his best beloved,—Rachel, so early lost,—the son, in respect to whom he feels at last a "reasonable assurance" that the youth has entered upon a glorious inheritance in those courts where one day he will join him, and the sainted Rachel too, and clasp again in his arms (if it be God's will) the babe that was his but for an hour on earth.

TIED TO A ROPE

You don't know what a Hircus Œpagrus is, Tommy? Well, it is a big name for him, isn't it? And if you should ask that somewhat slatternly female, who appears to employ tubs for the advantage of others rather than herself, what the animal is, she would tell you it is a goat. See what a hardy, sturdy little creature he is; and how he lifts up his startled head, as the cars come thundering along, and bounds away as if he were on the rugged hills that his ancestors climbed, ages ago, in wild freedom. O that cruel rope! how it stops him in his career with a sudden jerk that pulls him to the ground! See where it has worn away the hair round his neck, in his constant struggles to escape. See how he has browsed the scanty grass of that dry pasture, in the little circle to which he is confined, and is now trying to reach an uncropped tuft, just beyond his tether. And the sun is beating down upon him, and there is not the shade of a leaf for him to creep into, this July day. Poor little fellow!

Not waste my sympathy on a common goat? My dear Madam, I can assure you that ropes are not knotted around the neck of Hirci Œpagri alone. And when I was bemoaning the captivity of yonder little browser we have left behind, I was bewailing the fortune of another great order of the Mammalian class,—an order that Mr. Huxley and Mr. Darwin and other great thinkers of the day are proving to be close connections of their humbler brethren that bleat and bark and bray. The bimanal species of this order are similarly appendaged, though they are not apt to be staked beside railways or confined to a rood of ground.

Do you see Vanitas at the other end of the car? Does he look as though he carried about with him a "lengthening chain"? No one would certainly suppose it. Yet he is bound as securely as the poor little goat. We may go to the fresh air of his country-seat this July day, or to the sea-breezes of his Newport cottage next month, or he may sit here, "the incarnation of fat dividends," while you and I envy him his wealth and comforts; but he can never break his bonds. They are riveted to the counters of the money-changers, knotted around the tall masts of his goodly ships, bolted to the ore of his distant mines. He bears them to his luxurious home, and his fond wife, his caressing children, his troops of friends, can never strike them off. Ever and anon, as the car of fortune sweeps by to start him from his comfortable ease, they gall him with their remorseless restraint. You may cut the poor goat's rope and set him free, to roam where he will; but Vanitas has forged his own fetters, and there comes to him no blessed day of emancipation.

My dear Madam, the bright blue ether around us is traversed by a wonderful network of these invisible bonds that hold poor human beings to their fate. Over the green hills and over the blue waters, far, far away they reach,—a warp and woof of multiform, expansive strands, over which the sense of bondage moves with all the wondrous celerity of that strange force which, on the instant, speaks the thought of the Antipodes. You don't know that you carry about any such? Ah! it is well that they weigh so lightly. Utter your grateful thanks, to-night, when you seek your pillow, that the chains you wear are not galling ones. But you are most irrevocably bound. Frank holds you fast. One of these days, when you are most peaceful and content in your bondage, scarcely recognized, there may come a stately tread, a fiery eye, a glowing heart, to startle you from your quiet ease; and when you bound, trembling and breathless in their mighty sway, you may feel the chain—before so light—wearing its way deep into your throbbing heart. May you never wake on the morn of that day, Madam! You don't carry any such? Round a little white tablet, half hidden in the sighing grass, is linked a chain which holds you, at this moment, by your inmost soul. You are not listening to me now; for I have but touched it, and your breast is swelling 'neath its pressure, and the tears start to your eyes at its momentary tightness. You don't carry any such? We all carry them; and were human ears sensitive to other than the grosser sounds of nature, they would hear a strange music sweeping from these mystic chords, as they tremble at the touch of time and fate.

Master Tommy seems to be tolerably free from any sort of restraint, I acknowledge. In fact, it is he who keeps myself and Mrs. A. in the most abject servitude. He holds our nasal appendages close to the grindstone of his imperious will. And yet—please take him into the next car, Madam, while I speak of him. You cannot? What is this? Let me see, I pray you. As I live, it is his mother's apron-string. Ah! I fear, Madam, that all your efforts cannot break that tie. In the years to come, it will doubtless be frayed and worn; and, some day or other, he will bound loose from his childhood's captivity; but long ere that he will have other bonds thrown around him, some of which he can never break. He will weave with his own hands the silken cord of love, coil it about him, knot it with Gordian intricacy, net it with Vulcan strength, and then, with blind simplicity, place it in Beauty's hand to lead him captive to her capricious will. My dear Madam, did not Tommy's father do the same foolish thing? And is he not grateful to the lovely Mrs. Asmodeus for the gentleness with which she holds him in her power? Some of our bonds are light to bear. We glory in them, and hold up our gyves to show them to the world. Tommy may be a little shamefaced when his playmates jeer at the maternal tie; but he will walk forth, glowing with pride and joy, to parade his self-woven fetters ostentatiously in the sight of men. When you had done some such foolish thing yourself, did not your young mates gather round to view, with wondering and eager eyes, the result of your own handiwork at the cordage of love? Were there not many loquacious conclaves held to sit in secret judgment thereon? Were there not many soft cheeks flushing, and bright eyes sparkling, and fresh hearts beating, as you brought forth, with a pride you did not pretend to hide, the rose-colored fabric you had woven? And did they not all envy you, and wonder when their distaffs were to whirl to the tread of their own ready feet?

But we are not always eager or proud to exhibit our bonds. Indeed, we sedulously conceal them from every eye; we cover up the marks upon our scarred hearts with such jealous care, that none, not even our bosom friends, can ever see them. They hold us where the sweet herbage of life has become dry and sere, where no shelter offers us a grateful retreat. Vanitas can bear away with him his "lengthening chain" to his leafy groves; but Scripsit is confined to the torrid regions of his scanty garret. In vain he gazes afar, beyond the smoky haze of his stony prison, upon the green slopes and shady hills. In vain he toils and strains to burst the links that bind him. His soul is yearning for the cooling freshness, the sweet fragrance, the beauty, the glory, of the outer world. It is just beyond his reach; and, wearied with futile exertions, he sinks, fainting and despairing, in his efforts to rend the chain of penury. And there are many other bonds which hold us to areas of life from which we have gathered all the fresh bloom and the rich fruit. We may tread their barren soil with jewelled sandals, wrap around us ermined robes in winter's cold, and raise our silken tents in summer's glare, while our souls are hungering and thirsting for the ambrosia and the nectar beyond our tethered reach. We are held fast by honor, virtue, fidelity, pity,—ties which we dare not break if we could. We must not even bear their golden links to their extremest length; we must not show that they are chains which bind us; we must not show that we are hungering and thirsting in the confines to which they restrain us. We must seem to be feasting as from the flesh-pots of Egypt,—fattening on the husks which we have emptied,—while our souls are starving and fainting and dying within us. 'T is a sad music that swells from these chords. How fortunate that our ears are not attuned to their notes. And we are not always solitary in our bondage; nor do we tread round the cropped circuit, held to senseless pillars. We are chained to each other; and unhappy are they who, straining at the bond, seek food for their hearts in opposite directions. We are chained to each other; and light or heavy are the bonds, as Fortune shall couple us. Now you and Frank, I know, are leashed with down; and when Mrs. Asmodeus went to the blacksmith, the Vulcan of our days, to order my fetters, she bespoke gossamers, to which a spider's web were cable. But we are among the favored of Fortune's children. There are many poor unfortunates whose daily round is but the measured clank of hateful chains; who eat, drink, sleep, live together, in a bondage worse than that of Chillon,—round whom the bright sun shines, the sweet flowers bloom, the soft breezes play,—and yet who stifle in the gloom of a domestic dungeon.

And there are others fettered as firmly,—but how differently! The clasping links are soft, caressing arms; the tones their sounding chains give out are cheerful voices, joyous accents, words of love, that echo far beyond the little circle that they keep, and spread their harmony through many hearts. That little circle is a happy home; love spun the bonds that hold them close therein, and many are the strands that bind them there. They come from beauteous eyes that beam with light; from lisping tongues more sweet than seraph choirs; from swelling hearts that beat in every pulse with fond affection, which is richer far than all the nectar of the ancient gods. Bind me with these, O Fortune! and I hug my chains o'erjoyed. Be these the cords which hold me to the rock around which break the surging waves of time, and let the beak of Fate tear as it will, I hold the bondage sweet and laugh at liberty.

My dear Madam, there are chains which hold us as the cable holds the ship; and, in their sure restraint, we safely ride through all the howling blasts of adverse fate. The globe we tread whirls on through endless space, kept ever in the circuit that it makes by that restraining force which holds it to the pillar of the sun. Loose but the bond an instant, and it flies in wild, tangential flight, to shatter other worlds. The very bondage that we curse, and seek, in fretful mood, to break and burst, may keep us to the orbit that is traced, by overruling wisdom, for our good. We gravitate towards duty, though we sweep with errant course along the outer marge of the bare area of its tightened cord. Let but the wise restraint be rudely broke, and through life's peopled space we heedless rush, trampling o'er hearts, and whirling to our fate, leaving destruction on our reckless way.

Did you ever chance to see, Madam, a picture of those venturous hunters, who are lowered by a rope to the nests of sea-birds, built on some inaccessible cliff? Hanging between heaven and earth they sway;—above, the craggy rock, o'er which the single cord is strained that holds them fast; below, a yawning chasm, whose jagged depth would be a fearful grave to him who should fall. You and I would never dream of bird-nesting under such circumstances. I can see you shudder, even now, at the bare idea. Yet do we not sometimes hang ourselves over cliffs from which a fall were worse than death? Do we not trust ourselves, in venturous mood, to the frail tenure of a single strand which sways 'twixt heaven and earth? Not after birds' eggs, I grant you. We are not all of us so fond of omelettes. But over the wild crags of human passion many drop, pursuing game that shuns the beaten way, and sway above the depths of dark despair. Intent upon their prey, they further go, secure in the firm hold they think they have, nor heed the fraying line that, grating on the edge of the bare precipice, at last is worn and weak; while, one by one, the little threads give way, and they who watch above in terror call to warn them of the danger. But in vain! no friendly voice can stay their flushed success; till, at its height, the cord is suddenly snapped, and crushed upon the rocks beneath they lie. You and I will never go bird-nesting after this fashion, my dear Madam. Let us hover then around the crags of life, and watch the twisting strands that others, more adventurous than we, have risked themselves upon. Be ours the part to note the breaking threads, and, with our words of kindly warning, seek to save our fellows from a fall so dread.

And, if the ties of earth keep us from falling, so also do they keep us from rising above the level of grosser things. They hold us down to the dull, tedious monotony of worldly cares, aims, purposes. Like birds withheld from flight into the pure regions of the upper air by cruel, frightening cords, we fluttering go, stifled amid the vapors men have spread, and panting for the freedom that we seek.

Madam, our bright-eyed little goat has, by this time, settled himself calmly on the grass; and I see, near at hand, the shady groves where King Tommy is wont to lead Mrs. A. and myself in his summer wanderings. Let me hope that all our bonds may be those which hold us fast to peace, content, and virtue; and that, when the silver cord which holds us here to earth shall be loosed, we then on sweeping pinions may arise, pure and untrammelled, into cloudless skies.

GIOTTO'S TOWER

How many lives, made beautiful and sweet
By self-devotion and by self-restraint,—
Whose pleasure is to run without complaint
On unknown errands of the Paraclete,—
Wanting the reverence of unshodden feet,
Fail of the nimbus which the artists paint
Around the shining forehead of the saint,
And are in their completeness incomplete.
In the old Tuscan town stands Giotto's tower,
The lily of Florence blossoming in stone,—
A vision, a delight, and a desire,—
The builder's perfect and centennial flower,
That in the night of ages bloomed alone,
But wanting still the glory of the spire.

PASSAGES FROM HAWTHORNE'S NOTE-BOOKS

VI

Brook Farm, Oct. 9, 1841.—A walk this afternoon to Cow Island. The clouds had broken away towards noon, and let forth a few sunbeams, and more and more blue sky ventured to appear, till at last it was really warm and sunny,—indeed, rather too warm in the sheltered hollows, though it is delightful to be too warm now, after so much stormy chillness. O the beauty of grassy slopes, and the hollow ways of paths winding between hills, and the intervals between the road and wood-lots, where summer lingers and sits down, strewing dandelions of gold, and blue asters, as her parting gifts and memorials! I went to a grape-vine, which I have already visited several times, and found some clusters of grapes still remaining, and now perfectly ripe. Coming within view of the river, I saw several wild ducks under the shadow of the opposite shore, which was high, and covered with a grove of pines. I should not have discovered the ducks had they not risen and skimmed the surface of the glassy stream, breaking its dark water with a bright streak, and, sweeping round, gradually rose high enough to fly away. I likewise started a partridge just within the verge of the woods, and in another place a large squirrel ran across the wood-path from one shelter of trees to the other. Small birds, in flocks, were flitting about the fields, seeking and finding I know not what sort of food. There were little fish, also, darting in shoals through the pools and depths of the brooks, which are now replenished to their brims, and rush towards the river with a swift, amber-colored current.

Cow Island is not an island,—at least, at this season,—though, I believe, in the time of freshets, the marshy Charles floods the meadows all round about it, and extends across its communication with the mainland. The path to it is a very secluded one, threading a wood of pines, and just wide enough to admit the loads of meadow hay which are drawn from the splashy shore of the river. The island has a growth of stately pines, with tall and ponderous stems, standing at distance enough to admit the eye to travel far among them; and, as there is no underbrush, the effect is somewhat like looking among the pillars of a church.

I returned home by the high-road. On my right, separated from the road by a level field, perhaps fifty yards across, was a range of young forest-trees, dressed in their garb of autumnal glory. The sun shone directly upon them; and sunlight is like the breath of life to the pomp of autumn. In its absence, one doubts whether there be any truth in what poets have told about the splendor of an American autumn; but when this charm is added, one feels that the effect is beyond description. As I beheld it to-day, there was nothing dazzling; it was gentle and mild, though brilliant and diversified, and had a most quiet and pensive influence. And yet there were some trees that seemed really made of sunshine, and others were of a sunny red, and the whole picture was painted with but little relief of darksome hues,—only a few evergreens. But there was nothing inharmonious; and, on closer examination, it appeared that all the tints had a relationship among themselves. And this, I suppose, is the reason that, while Nature seems to scatter them so carelessly, they still never shock the beholder by their contrasts, nor disturb, but only soothe. The brilliant scarlet and the brilliant yellow are different hues of the maple-leaves, and the first changes into the last. I saw one maple-tree, its centre yellow as gold, set in a framework of red. The native poplars have different shades of green, verging towards yellow, and are very cheerful in the sunshine. Most of the oak-leaves have still the deep verdure of summer; but where a change has taken place, it is into a russet-red, warm, but sober. These colors, infinitely varied by the progress which different trees have made in their decay, constitute almost the whole glory of autumnal woods; but it is impossible to conceive how much is done with such scanty materials. In my whole walk I saw only one man, and he was at a distance, in the obscurity of the trees. He had a horse and a wagon, and was getting a load of dry brush-wood.

Sunday, October 10.—I visited my grape-vine this afternoon, and ate the last of its clusters. This vine climbs around a young maple-tree, which has now assumed the yellow leaf. The leaves of the vine are more decayed than those of the maple. Thence to Cow Island, a solemn and thoughtful walk. Returned by another path, of the width of a wagon, passing through a grove of hard wood, the lightsome hues of which make the walk more cheerful than among the pines. The roots of oaks emerged from the soil, and contorted themselves across the path. The sunlight, also, broke across in spots, and otherwheres the shadow was deep; but still there was intermingling enough of bright hues to keep off the gloom from the whole path.

Brooks and pools have a peculiar aspect at this season. One knows that the water must be cold, and one shivers a little at the sight of it; and yet the grass about the pool may be of the deepest green, and the sun may be shining into it. The withered leaves which overhanging trees shed upon its surface contribute much to the effect.

Insects have mostly vanished in the fields and woods. I hear locusts yet, singing in the sunny hours, and crickets have not yet finished their song. Once in a while I see a caterpillar,—this afternoon, for instance, a red, hairy one, with black head and tail. They do not appear to be active, and it makes one rather melancholy to look at them.

Tuesday, October 12.—The cawing of the crow resounds among the woods. A sentinel is aware of your approach a great way off, and gives the alarm to his comrades loudly and eagerly,—Caw, caw, caw! Immediately the whole conclave replies, and you behold them rising above the trees, flapping darkly, and winging their way to deeper solitudes. Sometimes, however, they remain till you come near enough to discern their sable gravity of aspect, each occupying a separate bough, or perhaps the blasted tip-top of a pine. As you approach, one after another, with loud cawing, flaps his wings and throws himself upon the air.