“Well, well,” said Jocunda, “who started this idea?”
“Oh, Father Francesco and she got it up between them,—and nothing will do but I must go, too.”
“Well, now, after all, my dear,” said Jocunda, “do you know, I made a pilgrimage once, and it isn’t so bad. One gets a good deal by it, first and last. Everybody drops something into your hand as you go, and one gets treated as if one were somebody a little above the common; and then in Rome one has a princess or a duchess or some noble lady who washes one’s feet, and gives one a good supper, and perhaps a new suit of clothes, and all that,—and ten to one there comes a pretty little sum of money to boot, if one plays one’s cards well. A pilgrimage isn’t bad, after all;—one sees a world of fine things, and something new every day.”
“But who is to look after our garden and dress our trees?”
“Ah, now, there’s Antonio, and old Meta his mother,” said Jocunda, with a knowing wink at Agnes. “I fancy there are friends there that would lend a hand to keep things together against the little one comes borne. If one is going to be married, a pilgrimage brings good luck in the family. All the saints take it kindly that one comes so far to see them, and are more ready to do a good turn for one when one needs it. The blessed saints are like other folks,—they like to be treated with proper attention.”
This view of pilgrimages from the material stand-point had more effect on the mind of Elsie than the most elaborate appeals of Father Francesco. She began to acquiesce, though with a reluctant air.
Jocunda, seeing her words had made some impression, pursued her advantage on the spiritual ground.
“To be sure,” she added, “I don’t know how it is with you; but I know that I have, one way and another, rolled up quite an account of sins in my life. When I was tramping up and down with my old man through the country,—now in this castle and then in that camp, and now and then in at the sacking of a city or village, or something of the kind,—the saints forgive us!—it does seem as if one got into things that were not of the best sort, in such times. It’s true, it’s been wiped out over and over by the priest; but then a pilgrimage is a good thing to make all sure, in case one’s good works should fall short of one’s sins at last. I can tell you, a pilgrimage is a good round weight to throw into the scale; and when it comes to heaven and hell, you know, my dear, why, one cannot be too careful.”
“Well, that may be true enough,” said Elsie,—“though, as to my sins, I have tried to keep them regularly squared up and balanced as I went along. I have always been regular at confession, and never failed a jot or tittle in what the holy father told me. But there may be something in what you say; one can’t be too sure; and so I’ll e’en school my old bones into taking this tramp.”
That evening, as Agnes was sitting in the garden at sunset, her grandmother bustling in and out, talking, groaning, and, hurrying in her preparations for the anticipated undertaking, suddenly there was a rustling in the branches overhead, and a bouquet of rose-buds fell at her feet. Agnes picked it up, and saw a scrip of paper coiled among the flowers. In a moment remembering the apparition of the cavalier in the church in the morning, she doubted not from whom it came. So dreadful had been the effect of the scene at the confessional, that the thought of the near presence of her lover brought only terror. She turned pale; her hands shook. She shut her eyes, and prayed that she might not be left to read the paper; and then, summoning all her resolution, she threw the bouquet with force over the wall. It dropped down, down, down the gloomy, shadowy abyss, and was lost in the damp caverns below.
The cavalier stood without the wall, waiting for some responsive signal in reply to his missive. It had never occurred to him that Agnes would not even read it, and he stood confounded when he saw it thrown back with such apparent rudeness. He remembered her pale, terrified look on seeing him in the morning. It was not indifference or dislike, but mortal fear, that had been shown in that pale face.
“These wretches are practising on her,” he said, in wrath,—“filling her head with frightful images, and torturing her sensitive conscience till she sees sin in the most natural and innocent feelings.”
He had learned from Father Antonio the intention of Agnes to go on a pilgrimage, and he longed to see and talk with her, that he might offer her his protection against dangers which he understood far better than she. It had never even occurred to him that the door for all possible communication would be thus suddenly barred in his face.
“Very well,” he said to himself, with a darkening brow,—“let them have it their own way here. She must pass through my dominions before she can reach Rome, and I will find a place where I can be heard, without priest or grandmother to let or hinder. She is mine, and I will care for her.”
But poor Agnes had the woman’s share of the misery to bear, in the fear and self-reproach and distress which every movement of this kind cost her. The involuntary thrill at seeing her lover, at hearing from him, the conscious struggle which it cost her to throw back his gift, were all noted by her accusing conscience as so many sins. The next day she sought again her confessor, and began an entrance on those darker and more chilly paths of penance, by which, according to the opinion of her times, the peculiarly elect of the Lord were supposed to be best trained. Hitherto her religion had been the cheerful and natural expression of her tender and devout nature according to the more beautiful and engaging devotional forms of her Church. During the year when her confessor had been, unconsciously to himself, led by her instead of leading, her spiritual food had been its beautiful old hymns and prayers, which she found no weariness in often repeating. But now an unnatural conflict was begun in her mind, directed by a spiritual guide in whom every natural and normal movement of the soul had given way before a succession of morbid and unhealthful experiences. From that day Agnes wore upon her heart one of those sharp instruments of torture which in those times were supposed to be a means of inward grace,—a cross with seven steel points for the seven sorrows of Mary. She fasted with a severity which alarmed her grandmother, who in her inmost heart cursed the day that ever she had placed her in the way of saintship.
“All this will just end in spoiling her beauty,—making her as thin as a shadow,”—said Elsie; “and she was good enough before.”
But it did not spoil her beauty,-it only changed its character. The roundness and bloom melted away,—but there came in their stead that solemn, transparent clearness of countenance, that spiritual light and radiance, which the old Florentine painters gave to their Madonnas.
It is singular how all religious exercises and appliances take the character of the nature that uses them. The pain and penance, which so many in her day bore as a cowardly expedient for averting divine wrath, seemed, as she viewed them, a humble way of becoming associated in the sufferings of her Redeemer. “Jesu dulcis memoria,” was the thought that carried a redeeming sweetness with every pain. Could she thus, by suffering with her Lord, gain power like Him to save,—a power which should save that soul so dear and so endangered! “Ah,” she thought, “I would give my life-blood, drop by drop, if only it might avail for his salvation!”
THE TRUE HEROINE
What was she like? I cannot tell.
I only know God loved her well.
Two noble sons her gray hairs blest,—
And he, their sire, was now at rest.
And why her children loved her so,
And called her blessed, all shall know:
She never had a selfish thought,
Nor valued what her hand had wrought.
She could be just in spite of love;
And cherished hates she dwelt above;
In sick-rooms they that had her care
Said she was wondrous gentle there.
It was a fearful trust, she knew,
To guide her young immortals through;
But Love and Truth explained the way,
And Piety made perfect day.
She taught them to be pure and true,
And brave, and strong, and courteous, too;
She made them reverence silver hairs,
And feel the poor man’s biting cares.
She won them ever to her side;
Home was their treasure and their pride:
Its food, drink, shelter pleased them best,
And there they found the sweetest rest.
And often, as the shadows fell,
And twilight had attuned them well,
She sang of many a noble deed,
And marked with joy their eager heed.
And most she marked their kindling eyes
When telling of the victories
That made the Stars and Stripes a name,
Their country rich in honest fame.
It was a noble land, she said,—
Its poorest children lacked not bread;
It was so broad, so rich, so free,
They sang its praise beyond the sea;
And thousands sought its kindly shore,
And none were poor and friendless more;
All blessed the name of Washington,
And loved the Union, every one.
She made them feel that they were part
Of a great nation’s living heart.—
So they grew up, true patriot boys,
And knew not all their mother’s joys.
Sad was the hour when murmurs loud
From a great black advancing cloud
Made millions feel the coming breath
Of maddened whirlwinds, full of death!
She prayed the skies might soon be bright,