HAMLET.
None of Shakspeare’s characters are insignificant. If I had been Garrick or Mrs. Siddons, I should have tried sometimes, as an experiment, the most apparently trifling of his personages. I believe they would give room for striking development, only there is this objection—neither Siddons nor Garrick, nor any other of the great actors could take parts promiscuously from the crowd. They are too unlike each other. They are too essentially different identities to permit of being represented by one. Garrick might take Macbeth in the play—and Scrub in the after-piece, and do them both well; but he could not play equally well with two such opposite characters by Shakspeare. No actor has appeared capable of playing all his principal tragic rôles well. It is sufficient honor to attain to the height of illustrating one or two. Kean, for example, was very great in Lear and Richard. He was fine, by starts, in Othello, but not equally so. He wanted sustained simplicity and calm grandeur. Othello was a hero of nature: he had the quiet self respect of a long successful soldier. Kean did not satisfy me, as a whole, in Othello. I like Forrest, in many respects, better. I saw Forrest play the part at Drury Lane one night far beyond what I had ever seen before; particularly the first half of the play was perfect; the last I thought wanted, although in a slight degree, that mellowing and chastening which time gives to a painting, and will, doubtless, perhaps has given, to this part of that dignified and impressive portraiture. He carried with him a crowded and intellectual audience—and, at certain points, profound and unbreathing silence—the highest applause—indicated the grasp this distinguished tragedian had on the minds of the people who have beheld the character so often and so grandly given—and so often and ably criticised. Cassio’s drunken scene was full of the thrilling strokes of a master.
Of the characters in these plays we may always speak as of historical characters—as if they had lived—just as the poet drew them. Men always do speak of them so. The opinions, even of these Shakspearian men and women, have authority in the senate and the field—at the bar and in the pulpit. Many a statesman—many an editor has struck at his antagonist with a citation, not from Shakspeare, but from his men and women. By a common consent of two centuries, Othello and Macbeth, Lear and Coriolanus, have lived—they have been substantial beings—their real historical individuality has passed into their dramatic being—and they appeal to our minds from the scenes where Shakspeare left them. So with all his vast crowd of people. A young man who has made himself really acquainted with this assemblage, will have formed valuable friends and advisers; and should he select properly the persons whose opinions he means to act on, he will live a happier and a wiser life than he could without them.
I have said there is no insignificant character in Shakspeare; so I may say there is scarcely one which would not make the subject of an interesting volume. As classes of men, scores of volumes might yet be written on the kings, the queens, the generals, the rebels, the usurpers—on the mothers, the children, the self-murderers, the assassins—on the poor and the rich, the innocent and the guilty—on the supernatural characters—on the noblemen and the peasants—on the fools and drunkards—on the spirits—on justices and physicians, landlords and servants—on sea captains, lawyers and executioners—on mobs and fairies—on Spaniards, Italians, English and Frenchmen—on Romans, Jews, shepherds, shepherdesses and wenches, courtiers, pages, etc., etc., etc. Indeed, there is scarcely an end to the various relations in which his characters may be considered; each one may be performed with effect. Nature has made, or will make, some particular mortals gifted with a distinct capacity to represent one of each of them—as Mrs. Siddons was for Lady Macbeth, and Kean for Lear. The greatest actors seem but prophets fitted to illustrate one or two of his creations. Some of them have never yet been represented as they may be. Probably Lady Macbeth, and Queen Catharine, in Henry VIII. will never be better given—as also Richard, Lear, and several others; but I suspect many of the subordinate rôles are yet to be filled.
There really are many indications which bear out the praise of the commentators, that this world was not large enough for his genius. His spirits, magicians, monsters, and ghosts, are evidences of it. Other writers have resorted to these materials before him, but only as a mode of acting on human feelings. It was reserved for Shakspeare to make us as well acquainted with the secret heart of a ghost as of a mortal. Hamlet’s spectre not only frightens and startles us—he touches our feelings. We see into that unearthly mind—that solitary, disembodied being—revisiting the scene of its mortal life, but indicating, fearfully, by its stealthy dim night walks—the solemn march with which it goes slow and stately by—its allusions to things too frightful for human ears—its guilty starting at the crowing of the cock, and its hurrying back to its nameless and awful task—its anguish-stricken bewailings over the earthly state of peace and happiness from which it was so ruthlessly hurled—indicating by all these and many more expressive tokens, the dark and sublime load of woe it bears, and appealing to our sympathy with terrible power. Ulrici may have found, in this scene, grounds for his theory.
The character of the unhappy exile from earth to the secret and impenetrable abode of spirits, is drawn with as much reality as that of Hamlet or the grave digger. There are two or three touches of individuality which invest it with a singular attraction. It is not only a ghost; it is the ghost of a particular individual—of a majestic, noble, benevolent, affectionate king, overwhelmed by a mighty calamity: the victim of the most shameful lewdness—the blackest treachery that ever was seen—and deploring, “in fire,” the “foul crimes” done in his “days of nature.” We are not to presume he had been a peculiarly wicked man, but he was suddenly called to his account before he could prepare himself to die.
What a sublime hint of Christianity is this, and how fraught with a tremendous lesson to all mankind. Death itself is not the misfortune; it is death to an unprepared spirit. That he was
“Sleeping, by a brother’s hand
Of life, of crown, of queen, at once despatched,”
is not so terrible as that he was cut off even in the blossoms of his sins—
“Unhousel’d, disappointed, unaneal’d:
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head.”
I have always thought this one of the sublimest and most terrible reaches of our author’s genius. All earthly misfortunes, regarded in their temporary consequences are, of course, unworthy to be placed in comparison with the misfortune of the immortal disembodied soul. The wreck of old Lear’s mind, the agonizing fall of Othello from bliss, the banishment and murder of Coriolanus, the stern fate of the sweet Juliet and her tender Romeo—all fall short of the horror of this spectral lamentation, coming up from the central caves of the earth, or the yet more unimaginable caverns of hell itself, and deploring in the “dead waste and middle of the night,” the vast, dire and unnameable wo it suffers from its unreflecting manner of living while yet a mortal tenant of the globe, and when the means of making its reckoning were yet within its power, and had been so unwisely neglected. Had this unhappy creature been a thinking and pious person, the sudden blow would not have found it unprepared. It would not have been wasting the precious hours of age in the blossoms of its sin. It would not have deferred the imperative duty of making its peace with the creator, and of endeavoring, (before the condemnation “to fast in fire”) to purify itself from earthliness—from the enervating and selfish tendencies of luxury and royal power, and from the soils and weaknesses of youthful passions, uncurbed, and the follies—perhaps we may also with justice term them “foul crimes”—which all mortals commit in a greater or less degree.
In these few words is a grave lesson to the men of the present living world. Many of the most prominent characters in history have felt, in time, the importance of the mighty truth which this “poor ghost” had neglected—and, by withdrawing from active life, as old age came on, and devoting themselves to reflection, to self-examination and self-purification, to thoughts of death and communion with their Maker, have endeavored to prepare themselves for the closing scene. Men require this process. We are all heated with the cares and passions of life, and cherish in our breasts flames which ought to be extinguished before we enter the presence of our Maker. Some abandon themselves to such unworthy wishes, to such mean, selfish and ridiculous opinions and determinations, that the years of ordinary old age cannot be too long to enable us to regain our balance, and to recover (or if we have never had it, to acquire) the dignity of a moral being. What a picture is presented to the imagination by the thought of a miser standing before the throne of God. How would a profligate feel, restored, as he will be by death, to a true estimation of himself, on being thrust suddenly before the dread tribunal; or, what would be the sensations of an arrogant, presumptuous man, going through life with no thought but himself and his own greatness, on being, like the ghost of Hamlet, “cut off” even in the blossoms of his sins, no reckoning made, “but sent to his account” with all his imperfections on his head? What would be the feelings of any mere worldly man—one who had been a cruel persecutor and oppressor—who had taken the bread from the widow and orphan?
All men have not sinned equally, but all men have sinned. It is not likely any one has gone through the world without having an opportunity of feeling, with a most bitter humiliation, the innate depravity and woful weakness of human nature, unless sustained by the creating hand. Trusted to themselves the stoutest will faint, the purest will be soiled. The events of life act upon the heart with a kind of chemical power, extracting from it baseness and weakness, as poison may be extracted from flowers. Perhaps this is capable of being turned to good, if read aright. For the heart which has looked in upon itself, with distrust and shame, is wiser and purer than any other: it is stronger also. To come to the feet of the Creator with a true trust in him, is almost impossible, till we have seen the shipwreck of self confidence, and felt that by ourselves we are less than nothing.
After a life, then, of action, and of temptation, of false hopes, ill placed affections, frivolous desires and enjoyments, and perhaps impious and guilty occupations, how happy he who has the wisdom to break away from them himself, before inexorable fate calls him, and who cleanses and prepares his spirit for the great change it is destined to undergo. I will not enter here upon the graver tenets of religion, but surely we may believe that he who sees in time the nature of sin, and disentangles himself from its snares—who spends the latter years of his life in a sincere endeavor to become what he ought to be, and to release his spirit from the world before his body is called away, if he cannot wholly efface the traces of sin, may soften them.
For my part, although not an old man, I begin already to look upon human life more as a spectator than an actor, and to feel myself within the sublime and mysterious attraction of another world. I distrust the effect upon me of the collisions, temptations and pleasures which I may yet have to encounter—and I feel a hesitation even in wishing for wealth or worldly honors. The idea of a hereafter—of the actual visible presence of my Maker—is becoming every day less remote and more familiar to me. It hushes the voice of indignation, and checks the impulse of contempt—which, when I keep my eyes on this world alone, I cannot always master. It teaches me that my mortal part, as far as related to earthly things, is a brief, passing shadow—that the world is but the reflection of one point in the career of the soul—that human vice and folly are but mysteries of nature, and that human passions were given us as our slaves—not our masters. No medicine—no magnetism can have a more striking influence than this thought, upon the physical as well as the moral part of me; and when I enter the chamber where a dead man is lying, I feel all that is bad within me so rebuked, silenced and destroyed—and all that is good so awakened, so pure, sustaining and holy, that I have little enthusiasm to search after the vain phantoms of mere earthly philosophy, or earthly happiness. I see only the form of religion, ever calm, ever young, standing above the wreck of the mortal universe, and pointing to another and a better one.
What a powerful stroke of dramatic art is it then in our great poet to throw this idea, not into the voice of a sage or a preacher, but to announce it to startled generations from the dim faded lips of a suffering spirit.
It has been a custom with many great characters, both of ancient and modern times, to devote the latter part of their lives to this moral preparation. It seems as if a kind Providence had conceived old age on purpose for this process. If we have lived properly, our minds will then have become cultivated in proportion as the body, that great tempter, has been weakened; and we are called upon to retire from the active world just when we are become unfit for it. Yet how many old men do we see clinging to its gilded toys, empty hopes, and frivolous amusements, without a thought of any thing beyond; or, how many a grey head is at this moment working schemes which might better become the imagination of the thoughtless school-boy, or the grovelling nature of the brute. In how many a heart, which should be the altar only for the pure, silent, undying flame of piety, do we see the unholy passions of earth burning beneath a hand which ever feeds with the impurest food their vain fires. How few are there among aged men who have thought of letting loose their hold on earth, of slackening their pursuit after wealth or vain distinctions, of turning their minds to the period (which to-morrow may bring) when all things not connected with their future career shall seem to them like infant toys.
I often think of that poor ghost’s touching lament, and hope that death may not find me thus unprepared. I take a profound lesson from this profoundest of mortal teachers, and learn to go through the earth like a passing traveller, paying but a brief visit of curiosity and instruction to its beautiful wonders, but who does not mean to build, even in the fairest of its bowers, or by the most tempting of its streams—because his home is in another country, to which all that he has and all that he loves is either gone or going.
How deeply Shakspeare—even the laughter-loving, etherial, sunshiny Shakspeare, was impressed with the same thought, you may gather from his works. It is not the night-walking spirit alone who utters to mankind this sublime truth, but the most high climbing and successful of his living personages also proclaim it. Prospero, among others, in a solemn and touching remark, betrays how full he is of the nothingness of mere human life. After having given utterance to that most magnificent of all the sublime breathings of a thoughtful mind—
“And like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this unsubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind.”
He invites his companions to his cell:
“Where you shall take your rest
For this one night; which (part of it) I’ll waste
With such discourse, as I no doubt, shall make it
Go quick away: the story of my life,
And the particular accidents gone by,
Since I came to this isle: and in the morn
I’ll bring you to your ship, and so to Naples,
Where I have hope to see the nuptial
Of these, our dear belov’d, solemnized;
And thence, retire me to my Milan, where
Every third thought shall be my grave.”
It is true this man has made himself a magician for the purposes of the poem; yet the reflection is that of a Christian turning away from the most splendid paths of this world to prepare himself for the next. Of the Tempest it may be said, in passing, that over it hangs a beautiful mystery which has not, that I am aware of, yet been explained. There is some deeper meaning in the extraordinary contrast of characters, in the delicate and harshly used Ariel—in the brutish and diabolical Caliban,
“Which any print of goodness will not take,
Being capable of all ill;”
and yet, by a mysterious exercise of power, obliged to obey an art sufficiently strong to control his “dam’s god Setebos.” I am so accustomed, in the works of Shakspeare, as in those of nature, to look for meaning where all seems most capricious, that I dwell with a kind of delightful curiosity over the grand and not yet all explained lessons of this fascinating creation. What a delightful amusement for an old age of leisure to relieve its graver moments by a habitual study of Shakspeare!
To return a moment to the spirit of Hamlet. The human traces found in this pale spectre are great heighteners of our interest in it, and of the probabilities of its existence. The return to Elsinore, and to the platform before the castle, in the night, when the sentinels are on guard—its appearance first to the soldiers on the watch—then to Horatio, who has been induced to watch by the report of it—its sudden appearance, and equally abrupt disappearance—giving an idea of capricious impulses and laws not within the reach of mortal conjecture—its seeking out its son as the confidant of the amazing secret, are all ghost-like, and yet show the shadow of mortality. Its dismal, half-breathed, mysterious revelations of what it is undergoing in its new abode, are spectral to the last degree; but there is nothing which elevates it to a higher and nobler place in our commiseration, than the exquisitely tender allusion to the guilty queen. This is the mortal, always majestic, superior, merciful and refined—but now enlightened and subdued by the influences of its new state.
“But, how-so-ever thou pursu’st this act,
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive
Against thy mother aught; leave her to heaven,
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge
To prick and sting her.”
And then the startled, reluctant, yet abrupt and compelled return.
“Fare thee well at once!
The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
And ’gins to pale his uneffectual fire;
Adieu, adieu, adieu. Remember me.”
Again, in the scene where Hamlet kills Polonius, and reveals to his mother his full knowledge of her crime, the spirit wo-stricken, and bringing with it always the terrible cold breath of the other world—yet still, with the fingerings of human affection, is touched with pity at the terror and suffering of her whom it had once loved:
“But, look! amazement on thy mother sits:
Oh, step between her and her fighting soul;
Conceit in weakest bodies strongest works.
Speak to her Hamlet.”
BALLAD.
———
BY J. R. LOWELL.
———
Gloomily the river floweth,
Close by her bower door,
And drearily the nightwind bloweth
Across the barren moor.
It rustles through the withered leaves
Upon the poplars tall,
And mutters wildly ’neath the eaves
Of the unlighted hall.
The waning moon above the hill
Is rising strange and red,
And fills her soul, against her will,
With fancies lone and dread.
The stream all night will flow as drearful,
The wind will shriek forlorn,
She fears—she knows that something fearful
Is coming ere the morn.
The curtains in that lonely place
Wave like a heavy pall,
And her dead mother’s pale, pale face
Doth flicker on the wall.
And all the rising moon about
Her fear did shape the clouds,
And saw dead faces staring out
From coffins and from shrouds.
A screech-owl now, for three nights past,
Housed in some hollow tree,
Sends struggling up against the blast
His long shriek fearfully.
Strange shadows waver to and fro,
In the uncertain light,
And the scared dog hath howled below
All through the weary night.
She only feels that she is weak
And fears some ill unknown,
She longs, and yet she dreads to shriek
It is so very lone.
Her eyeballs in their sockets strain,
Till the nerves seem to snap,
When blasts against the window-pane
Like lean, dead fingers tap.
And still the river floweth by
With the same lonely sound,
And the gusts seem to sob and sigh,
And wring their hands around.
Is that a footstep on the stair,
And on the entry-floor?
What sound is that, like breathing, there?
There, close beside the door!
Hush! hark! that was a dreadful sigh!
So full of woe, so near!
It were an easier thing to die
Than feel this deadly fear.
One of her ancestors she knew
A bloody man had been,
They found him here, stabb’d through and through,
Murdered in all his sin.
The nurse had often silenced her,
With fearful tales of him—
God shield her! did not something stir
Within that corner dim?
A gleam across the chamber floor—
A white thing in the river—
One long, shrill, shivering scream, no more,
And all is still forever!
THE ROMAN BRIDE.
A TALE OF THE WESTERN EMPIRE.
———
BY THE AUTHOR OF “THE BROTHERS,” “CROMWELL,” “RINGWOOD THE ROVER,” ETC.
———
The might and glory which had of yore reared the imperial city to its throne of universal domination, had long ago departed from the degenerate and weak posterity of the world’s conquerors! The name of Roman was but the lucid meteor of the charnel imparting a faint lustre to corruption and decay! The bold hordes of the hardy north had oftentimes already avenged the wrongs done by the elder Cæsar, while the frail silken puppets, who had succeeded to his style and station, trembled in the unguarded capital at every rumor from beyond the Danube. For, to the limits of that mighty river had they extended, years before the time of which we write, their arms, their arts, their sciences, and their religion—the pure and holy doctrines of the crucified Redeemer. All the Dalmatian coast of the bright gulf of Venice, now little more known than the wilds of central Asia, was studded with fair towns, and gorgeous palaces, and gay suburban villas; and all the wide spread plains of Thrace and Thessaly, now forest-clad and pathless, save to the untamed klepht or barbarous tartar, waved white with crops of grain, and blushed with teeming vineyards, and nurtured a dense happy population. At times indeed the overwhelming deluge of barbarian warfare had burst upon those fertile regions; and, wheresoever it burst,
“With sweepy sway
Their arms, their arts, their gods were whirled away—”
yet ever, when the refluent billows ebbed, the grass had sprung up green and copious even in the horse tramps of the innumerable cavalry that swelled the armies of the north, and the succeeding summer had smiled on meads and vineyards abundant as before, and on a population careless and free and jocund.
But now a mightier name was on the wind—a wilder terror was abroad—Attila!—Attila—the dread Hun! Still all as yet was peace; and, although rumors were abroad of meetings beyond the Danube; of the bent bow—emblem of instant warfare—sent with the speed of horse o’er moor, morass, and mountain—although the tribute, paid yearly by the degenerate Cæsars, had been refused indignantly by the bold Marcian—bold, and wise, and worthy the best days of the republic!—although from all these tokens prudent men had foreseen the wrath to come, and brave men armed to meet it, and cowards fled before it; still careless and improvident the crowd maintained their usual demeanor, and toiled, and laughed, and bought, and sold, and feasted, and slept sound o’ nights, as though there were no such things on earth as rapine, and revenge, and merciless unmitigated war.
It was as sweet and beautiful an evening in the early autumn as ever looked down with bright and cheerful smile from the calm heavens upon man’s hour of rest, what time the labor and the burthen of the day all past and over, he gathers round him his blythe household, and no more dreaming of anxiety or toil or sorrow, looks confidently forward to a secure night and happy morrow. And never did the eye of day, rising or sitting, look down from his height upon a brighter or a happier assemblage than was gathered on that evening in a sweet rural villa, scarce a mile distant from the gates of Singidurum one of the frontier towns of Masia on the Danube.
It was a wedding eve—the wedding of two beings both young and beautiful and loving. Julia, the fairest of the province, the bright and noble daughter of its grave proconsul, famed for her charms, her arts, her wit and elegance, even in the great Rome itself before her father had taken on himself—alas! in an evil hour—the duties and the honors of that remote provincial government—and brave Aurelius, the patrician—Aurelius, who, though not yet had he reached his thirtieth summer, had fought in nine pitched battles, besides affairs of posts and skirmishes past counting—won no less than five civic crowns, for the lives saved of Romans on the field, and collars, and horse trappings, and gold bracelets, as numerous as were awarded to the deeds of Marius, when valor was a common virtue in Rome’s martial offspring.
They were a noble pair, and beautiful, as noble—well-matched—she, light as the summer cloud and airy as its zephyr and graceful as the vine that waves at every breath—he vigorous and tall as the young oak before the blight of eld has gnarled one giant limb or scathed one wreath of its dark foliage.
Delicate, fair, and slender and tall beyond the middle height of woman with a waist ‘shaped to love’s wish’ and every graceful outline full of rich rounded symmetry, young Julia was a thing to dream of as the inhabitant of some far bright Elysian, rather than to behold as an inmate of the rude heartless world. It seemed as though it were a sin that the sun’s ardent kiss should visit her transparent cheek too warmly, that any breath but that of the softest summer gale should wanton in the luxuriant ringlets of her long silky auburn hair—her eyes were blue and clear as the bosom of some pure moonlit fountain, and there was in them a wild, yet not unquiet gaze, half languor and half tenderness. She was indeed a creature but little fitted to battle with the cares and sorrows of this pilgrimage, and as she leaned on the stalwart arm of her warrior lover, hanging upon him as if confident in his vast strength and relying absolutely on his protection, and fixing the soft yearning gaze of those blue eyes full on his broad brow and expressive lineaments, no one could doubt that she had chosen well the partner who should support and guide her through this vale of tears and sin and sorrow.
But who thought then of tears—who ever dreamed of sorrow? The day had been passed happily—alas! how happily!—in innocent and pure festivity—the blythe dance on the velvet greensward, the joyous ramble amid the trelliced vines, the shadowy cypresses, the laurelled mazes of the garden; with lyre and lute and song, and rich peals of the mellow flute and melancholy horn blent with the livelier clashing of the cymbals, waking at intervals the far and slumbering echoes of the dark wilderness beyond the Danube. Oh! had they but known what ears were listening to their mirthful music, what eyes were gloating with the fierce lust of barbarous anticipation on their fair forms and radiant faces, what hearts were panting amid the dense and tangled forests for the approaching nightfall—how would their careless mirth have been converted into despair and dread and anguish, their languishing and graceful gait into precipitate and breathless flight—those blythe light hearted beings!
The sun set glowing in the west—glowing with the bright promise of a lovely morrow—and many an eye dwelt on his waning glories, and drew bright augeries from the rich flood of lustre, which streamed in hues of varying rose and gold up to the purpled zenith; while on the opposite verge of heaven, the full orbed moon had hung already her broad shield of virgin silver, with Lucifer the star of love kindling his diamond lamp beside her.
“Farewell, great sun—and blessings be upon thy course”—whispered Aurelius to his lovely bride, as hanging fondly on his arm, she watched from the Ionic porticoes of spotless Parian marble, the last sun of her maiden days—“that thou hast set so calm and bright, and with such promise of a glorious future—Hail, Julia, Hail with me the happy omen!”
“To-morrow”—she replied in tones of eloquent music, half blushing as she spoke even at the intensity of her own feelings—“To-morrow, my Aurelius, I shall be thine, all thine!”—
“And art thou not all mine, even now, beloved—By the bright heavens above us—for long—long years!—my heart with all its hopes and fears and aspirations, my life with its whole crime and purpose—my soul with its very essence and existence have been thine—all! all thine—my Julia—and art not thou mine, now!—why what save death should sever us?—”
“Talk not of death!”—she answered with a slight shiver running through all her frame—“Talk not of death, Aurelius—I feel even now as if his icy breath was blowing on my spirit, his dim and awful shadow reflecting darkness on my every thought—dost thou believe, Aurelius, that passing shades like these, which will at times sadden and chill the soul, are true presentiments of coming evil?”
“That do I not—sweet love”—he answered—“that do I not believe; when by chance or some strain of highly wrought and thrilling sentiment the heart-strings of us mortals are attuned too high beyond their wont, like harp chords, they will harmonize to any sound or sentiment that accords to their own spirit pitch; and, neither sad nor joyous in themselves, will respond readily to either grief or sorrow: that, feeling no cause for mirth or gloom, we fancy them prophetic feelings, when they are but reflected tones, and so disquiet ourselves often with a vain shadow!”
“Well,”—she replied, still sadly—“I wish it may be so, as I suppose it is. Yet—yet—I would it were to-morrow!”
“Come, come! I must not have thee thus sad on an eve like this, my Julia—lo! they have lighted up the hall—and the banquet is spread, and the wine poured—the queen of the feast must not be absent!”
And shaking off the gloom which had, she knew not why, oppressed her, she turned with one long lingering last glance to the sun as he disappeared behind the dark tree tops which seemed to swallow him up in an unnatural gloom, and entered the vast hall which, hung with tapestries of silk and gold, and garlanded with wreaths of choice flowers, and reeking with unnumbered perfumes, lighted with lamps of gold pouring their soft illumination over the gorgeous boards, shewed like a very palace of the senses.
The bridal strains burst forth harmonious at the first, and slow and solemn, but quickening and thrilling as they rose, till every ear that heard them responded to their enlivening impulse, and every bosom glowed and panted to their expressive cadences. The wine went round, and laughter circled with it, and many a tender glance was interchanged, and many a whisper that called up burning blushes, and many a pressure of young hands betwixt those, who hoped that as this night to Julia and Aurelius, so should one be for them at no far distant!—and many prayed that such might be their lot—and many envied them!—Oh God, what blinded worms we be—when left to our own guidance!
The bridal feast was over—the bridal hymns were hushed—the banquet hall was left deserted—for in an inner chamber all hung with spotless white at a small altar placed beneath a cross gorgeous with gold and jewels stood Julia and Aurelius—the tender and solicitous mother and the gray headed noble father at her side—the priest of God before them, and all the joyous company hushed in mute awe, that arose not from fear—and the faith of that bright pair was plighted, and the gold ring set on the slender finger, and the last blessing was pronounced, and they two were made one.
Just in that breathless pause as the words of the priest ceased to sound, although their cadences were still ringing in the ears of all who heard them—there was a sudden rustle heard without, and a dread cry. “The city!—the city!—Singidurum!” So piercing was the cry, that not one of all those who heard it, but felt that something dreadful was in progress—in an instant the whole company rushed out into the portico—and lo! one flood of crimson flame was soaring up the sky from what an hour before had been a beauteous and a happy town—and a confused din of roars and howls burst with the shrill yells of despairing women, the clash of arms, and the thundering downfall of towns, palaces, and temples, filled the whole atmosphere with fiendish uproar. Scarce had they time to mark, or comprehend what they beheld, before, about them, and around, on every side came the thick beating hoofs—and in another moment they might see the myriads of the Hunish horsemen circling them in on every side, and cutting off all hope of flight or rescue with a dark living rampart. “Romans,” Aurelius shouted—“Romans to arms—for life, and liberty, and vengeance!”
His words were obeyed instantly, for all perceived their truth—but what availed it? To hew down a dozen trees and batter down the village gates was but a moment’s work for the blood-thirsty hordes who swarmed around the building. The outer gate was shattered in a moment—the inner, frailer yet, gave at the first assault, and now no bulwark was left any longer to the Romans save in their own good swords and stalwart sinews! Bravely they fought—aye, desperately—heaping the marble floors with mangled carcasses, and dying, each man where he stood, where the sword smote or javelin pierced him, dauntless and undismayed. Long they fought, for each Roman slain cutting down ten barbarians—but by degrees they were borne back—back at the sword’s point, foot by foot—and marking every step by their own streaming gore. At the hour’s end but five were left—five, and all wounded, and one old: the father of the wretched Julia, Aurelius and his brother, and two young nobles of the province. Retreating, step by step, they were at last driven back into the bridal chamber—the altar stood there yet, and the great cross above it, and the priest clinging to the cross, and at his feet the bride, with her fair tresses all dishevelled and all her lovely comrades prostrate upon the ground around her. The door was barred within—brief respite, no defence—and the strong men leaned upon their weapons in despair and gazed on one another, and then from one another to the women. It was a sad and awful scene. A rush of heavy feet was heard without—a halt, and then a rustling sound, with now a clang of steel and now the clatter of a grounded spear, as if the multitude was getting silently into array and order—a pause, and a loud cry!—“Attila!—Attila!—the king!”
Then came a slow and measured footstep striding up to the door—one short and heavy blow upon the pannel, as with a sword’s hilt—and a stern, grave voice exclaimed “Open!”
“I will,” answered Aurelius, “they would destroy it in an instant—it is but one chance in a myriad, but best trust to his mercy.” With the words he drew back bar after bar, and threw the door wide open—and there! there on the very threshold, with his swart cicatrized features, and short, square, athletic form, sheathed in scale armor of a strange device, with the hideous Charntean head gleaming out grim and awful from his breastplate, and the strange sword—all iron, hilt and blade, and guard and scabbard—his weapon and his God, firmly grasped in his right hand, but as yet bloodless—there stood the dreadful Hun!
“Death,” he exclaimed—“Death to all who resist,” in tones singularly deep and stern and solemn—“Mercy to those who yield them!”
“Do with us as thou wilt, great king,” returned Aurelius steadily, lowering as he spoke his sword’s point—“but spare our women’s honour!”
“Down with thy weapon, or die, Roman!” thundered the monarch, striding forward as he spoke and raising his sword high.
“The terms, great Attila?”
“Death for resistance!—Mercy for surrender!—A king’s love for fair women!” shouted the Hun, enraged at finding opposition where he dreamed not of meeting any, and his blood fired almost beyond endurance by the exquisite charms of the women, whom he could clearly see beyond their few defenders.
“Then die, Aurelius! die as becomes a Roman—and by the Heavens above us both, I will die with you,” exclaimed Julia, nerved by despair to courage.
“Ha! wilt thou?” exclaimed Attila; “Onegisus, reserve that girl who spoke so boldly, and that black-haired maid with the jewelled collar, for the king’s pleasure! Make in, Huns,” he added in an appalling shout—“kill, win, enjoy—but leave this dog to me!” and with the word he assailed, sword in hand, the new-made husband. One deadly close charge, and the four defenders were hewn down—yea! hewn limb from limb, by a hundred weapons—and then what followed was too terrible for words—enough! all that war has most horrible—murder and agony and violation, in their worst, most accursed shapes, reigned there and revelled fiends incarnate.
Onegisus had seized the bride and the other wretched girl indicated by the king, and they were for the moment safe among the tumult—and still Aurelius and Attila fought hand to hand, unwounded, and well paired, a perilous and deadly duel. And ever as she stood there, unconscious of the hellish deeds that were in progress round her, she gazed with a calm, fearless eye upon her bridegroom. Onegisus had her grasped firmly by the left arm, and as she neither strove, nor shrieked, nor struggled, but stood still as a marble statue, he thought no more about it, but gazed himself with all his eyes upon the combat. At last, as if by mutual consent, the champions paused for breath.
“Thou art brave, Roman,” said the Hun, in his deep, stern, low tones, not seeming in the least degree disturbed or out of wind—“Attila loves the brave!—Live and be free!”
“Her honour, mighty Attila—my young bride’s honour—be merciful and generous as thou art brave and noble.”
“Choose—fool!” the king exclaimed in a voice resembling more the growl of a famished tiger than any human sound—“choose between life or death!”
“Death or her honor!”
“Then die—idiot—Roman!” sneered the other, and with a fearful cry, grinding his teeth till the foam flew from them as from the tusks of a hunted boar, he leaped upon Aurelius. Three deadly blows were interchanged, and at each blow a wound—but at the fourth, Attila’s sword descending like a thunderbolt, shivered the Roman’s blade into a thousand pieces, and, glancing from his helmet, alighted on his shoulder, and clove deep into his chest!—he staggered forward, and at the next instant met the sword’s point, driven home by a tremendous thrust into his very vitals. Headlong he fell backward; but, as he fell, his glazing eyes turned fearfully toward his loved Julia—they glazed fast—but he saw, and smiled in dying, and died happy! For, as the last blow fell, she saw the fight was over—and by a sudden movement, the less expected from her complete and passive quietude, she snatched a long knife from the girdle of Onegisus, and before he well knew what she had done, much less had time to prevent it, had stabbed herself three times—each time mortally—into her virgin bosom.
“Husband,” she cried, “I come!—true to my word—Aurelius—I am thine now—all thine!” and, as the horror-stricken Hun released his hold upon her arm, she darted forward, and threw herself upon the bosom of her brave lord. Convulsively, in the death spasm, his arms closed about her,
And in that act
And agony her happy spirit fled.
NIAGARA.
[WRITTEN ON THE BANK OF THE NIAGARA RIVER—BETWEEN THE RAPIDS AND THE CATARACT.]
———
BY GRENVILLE MELLEN.
———
Their roar is round me. I am on the brink
Of the great waters—and their anthem voice
Goes up amid the rainbow and the mist.
Their chorus shakes the ground. I feel the rock
On which my feet hang idly—as they hung
O’er babbling brooks in boyhood—quivering
Under the burst of music. Awful voice!
And strong, triumphant waters! Do I stand
Indeed amid your shoutings? Is it mine
To shout upon this grey cliff, where the bird,
The cloudy monarch-bird, shrieks from his crag,
O’er which he’s wheel’d for cent’ries. I lift up
My cry in echo. But no sound is there—
And my shout seems but whisper. I’m afraid
To gaze or listen! Yet my eye and ear
Are servants to a necromance that God
Alone can hold o’er Nature! Ministers,
At this immortal shrine of the Great King!
Ye never tiring waters! Let me pass
Into your presence—and within the veil
That has no holy like it—a great veil,
Within which the omnipotent outspeaks
In thunder and in majesty—within
The shadow of a leaping sea—where He
Opens His lips in wonder—and His brow
Bends ’neath a crown of glory from the skies!
My prayer has speeded to the fount of power—
The veil has lifted—and I’ve entered in!
I feel like one whose visage has been bar’d
In presence of the Father of all earth—
Like one transported to another sphere,
Of the far company that walks the sky,
Who, in the stern confronting of a God
Has scann’d his own dimensions, and fall’n back
From an archangel’s reaching, to a man—
I feel like one on whom eternity
Has graven its large language, in the lines
Which mem’ry may not pass—nor can send back!
I am as one admitted to the door
That bars me from the future—the black port
Where clust’ring worlds come round, of spirits dim
Beckon’d to mysteries of another land.
Tell not of other portals—tell me not
Of other power or awfulness. If you’ve stood
Within that curtain of Charybdis—if
You’ve seen and heard the far-voiced flood above,
Clapping its thousand hands, and heralding
Seas to a new abyss—you have seen all
The earth has of magnificent, like this—
You’ve stood within a gate that leads to God;
Where the strong beings of his mercy bend
And do his will with power—while they uphold
Our steps that grope the footstool.
O! go in
Say not that to your gaze has been unbar’d
The mightiness of majesty, until
You’ve stood within the shadow of that sea
And heard it call unto you—until eye
And ear have stood the terrible rebuke
That rolls from those great caverns—till your blood
Flies to its citadel, and you grow white
Within the whirlpool presence of a flood
That leapt thus when on soaring Ararat
Rested the broad bark of a world! say not
The front of glory has been yet reveal’d
Until you’ve felt the tempest in that cloud
And heard, ’mid rock and roar, that harmony
That finds no echo like it in the sea!
O! go in
All ye who view not earth as monuments
And men as things but built to—to decay;
Pass ye within—ye will take lesson there.
How passing is the littleness of Earth—
How broad the empyrean reach of Heaven—
How fading is the brilliance of a world—
How beautiful the majesty of God!
THE VAGRANT.
———
BY LOUIS FITZGERALD TASISTRO.
———
A man was lying at the further end of a dismal cell, in the prison of Versailles, when one of the jailors, thrusting a huge key into the lock of a small but massive door, roused him with the unwelcome salutation, “come, get up—the time is come, and the gentlemen are waiting for you.”
“What, already!” replied the unhappy wretch to whom these words were addressed, and stretching his muscular limbs, he added, “what a pity, I was so sound asleep!”
He rose, shook the bits of straw from his hair and beard, and putting on the remains of an old hat, which had once been white, calmly said, “well, I am ready—the sooner it is over the better.”
The executioner, who was waiting with one of his assistants in the outer vestibule of the prison, threw an oblique glance upon the prisoner, then, looking at his watch, exclaimed, “come, make haste! we are already after our time—the market is nearly over.”
“Oh, but you have not far to go,” replied the turnkey; then addressing the prisoner—“old one,” said he, “it will soon be over, and the weather is fine. Here, take this, it will keep up your spirits.” And he handed him a glass of brandy, which the prisoner drank off with evident delight.
“Thanks, good master,” he replied, returning the glass to the good natured turnkey, “I shall never forget your kindness.”
“Well, well,” said the latter, “that is settled. Never mind what I do for you, man—it is little enough, God knows—only behave well—dost hear?”
The executioner’s man drew from his pocket a long and strong cord, with a slip knot at the end, and tightly tied the hands of the convict, who calmly looked at him, and said not a word. The executioner himself carried a board, on which was a sort of notice, partly printed and partly written; and all three proceeded slowly towards the market place, where the prisoner was to be placed in the pillory for one hour, and exposed to the gibes and taunts of an almost ferocious populace.
From the scaffold to which he was fastened, the old mendicant cast a look of pity upon the crowd, and said—
“Well, and what are you looking at? am I an object of such intense curiosity? But you are right; look at me well, for you shall never more behold me. I shall not return from the place to which they are going to take me—not that I fear a dungeon, for I have been too long accustomed to have no other bed than the cold ground. No, I shall return hither no more; and I should have done well had I not returned this time. But I could not help it. I was born here, though I never told any body so; and I love the spot where I first drew breath. ’Tis natural enough; yet why should I love it? I never knew either home or parents—the latter left me, when an infant, upon the steps of the church of St. Louis.”
Here the sun-burnt countenance of the old mendicant assumed an expression of bitterness.
“Who knows,” he continued, “but I may have among you some uncles or cousins—perhaps even nearer relatives.”
The crowd gathered round the scaffold, listening to the words of the mendicant.
“And my excellent father,” said the latter, “what a pity he is not here to own me! Perhaps he would be delighted at the elevation to which I have attained. For my own part, I never had a son; but if I had, I could not have deserted him. He should never have been able to reproach me with being the author of his misery. The other day I was hungry—I asked for a morsel of bread—everybody refused to give it me; and that is the reason why I am here.”
As the old man uttered the last sentence, his head fell upon his chest, and he wept.
At length the executioner returned, accompanied by his assistant, who carried upon his shoulders a furnace, in which was an iron instrument, with a long wooden handle. Both ascended the scaffold, and placed themselves behind the mendicant. The crowd drew nearer. The executioner’s man laid the mendicant’s shoulder bare, whilst the executioner himself stooped and took up the instrument. The poor convict shuddered, uttered a plaintive cry, a light smoke arose, and the ignominious letter was imprinted for ever.
The poor man, scarcely able to stand, was helped from the scaffold, and conveyed back to his prison through the crowd, who pressed upon his passage to glut upon his sufferings.
Old Philippe—such was the mendicant’s name, was well known in the department of Seine and Oise; but nobody could tell who he was, whence he came, or who his parents were. About fifteen years previous, just after the restoration, he had appeared in the country for the first time. He then asked questions, and seemed in pursuit of information on secret matters, of which nobody could penetrate the motive. After some time, he appeared to suffer much, as if from disappointment, and then disappeared. About two years before the period of our narrative, he again made his appearance at Versailles, very much altered, and looking much older. Fortune had not smiled upon him during his absence, for he went away a poor man, and returned a mendicant.
No one knew where he had been, or how he had lived during this interval. It was supposed, that, previous to his first appearance at Versailles, he had travelled a great deal, and even borne arms; for of late years, whenever he obtained the favor of a night’s lodging in a barn, he would repay this hospitality by descriptions of foreign countries, and accounts of bloody conflicts.
On the day after his exposure in the pillory, as above related, the following particulars concerning him were made known:—
One evening, faint with hunger and fatigue, after having begged through the environs of Versailles, without once obtaining alms, and his wallet having been empty for the two preceding days, he had stopped at the door of one of those elegant habitations which overlook the heights of Rocquencourt.
He begged a shelter for the night, and a morsel of bread, but both were refused him, and he was rudely driven from the door. Leaning upon his stick, he slowly quitted the inhospitable mansion, and with difficulty gained a part of the demesne laid out in the English style of landscape gardening. Taking shelter under a thick clump of trees, he laid himself upon the grass, to die with the least possible pain.
The autumn had already begun. The grass was wet—the wind whistled through the trees, already in part stripped of their leaves—all around was pitchy dark, and every thing seemed to announce an inclement night. Cramped with cold, he felt the most unconquerable gnawings of hunger. Could he but sleep, he thought, perhaps the next day might prove less unfavorable than the two preceding ones. But sleep refused the call, and the poor mendicant suffered the most cruel pangs. Unable to bear them any longer, he rose, took his stick, and returned to the mansion.
He had observed an angle of the wall which could be easily escaladed, and a window badly closed. It was late, the night was dark, and he might perhaps find a bit of bread. At least, he determined to try.
The house was inhabited by an old man of more than eighty—a rich miser, who lived alone, like many of those who go to spend their last days at Versailles. He had perceived the mendicant, and had seen him take refuge under the clump of trees. He ordered his servants to watch him, and scarcely had poor Philippe opened the window, when he was seized, handcuffed, and taken to Versailles, where he was thrown into prison. There, at least, he found shelter, and a bit of bread to eat, which the turnkey gave him from humanity.
At the expiration of six months, the mendicant was convicted at the assizes of the department of Seine et Oise. His sentence was the gallies for fifteen years, and to be previously exposed and branded. He had entered a house at night for the purpose of theft, and with deadly weapons—the possession of the knife, which he usually carried in his pocket, and was found there, being thus interpreted.
A month had already elapsed since he had been publicly branded, and poor Philippe seemed patiently waiting for the time when he was to be sent to his destination at Toulon. He always said that he would not go, and the turnkey did not contradict him.
One evening a small iron lamp upon a shelf, suspended from the wall by a cord on each side, threw a weak and vacillating light upon the gloom of a cell in the prison of Versailles.
Upon a straw matress, half covered with an old patched blanket, lay a man apparently overcome with weakness and despair. His face was turned towards the wall. An earthen jug without a spout was near him, and close to it a wooden bowl filled with soup.
“Poor Philippe will never get over it,” said the turnkey in the corridor, speaking to some one to whom he was showing the way. “But it is his own fault; he would not remain in the infirmary. The fact is, Monsieur le Curé, ever since he exhibited upon the little stage, about a month ago—curse this lock, it would sprain the wrist of the devil himself—”
“Peace my friend,” replied a mild voice, “do not swear—it is an offence against God.”
The door of the prison was at length opened, and the turnkey ushered in a venerable priest, the chaplain of the prison.
“Hollo, old one!” cried the jailor, “take heart, man, here is a visitor. Here is Monsieur le Curé come to see you.”
The mendicant made no reply.
“My friend,” said the minister of the Gospel, “I am one of your brethren in Christ, and I bring you words of peace and consolation. Hear me, in the name of our Lord Jesus, who died on the cross to atone for our sins—He suffered more than you; and it depends upon yourself to be one day happy, and to dwell with him in eternal life.”
Still the prisoner spoke not.
“He sleeps,” said the kind-hearted turnkey. “If your reverence will but wait a moment I will awake him.” And he shook the mendicant, but in vain—the latter stirred not. “Oh! oh!” said the jailor, leaning over him; “but it is all over with him; he has slipped his wind—the poor fellow’s as dead as a door post.”
And, in fact, the unfortunate Philippe had ceased to live a few moments after he had been removed, that very morning, at his own request, from the infirmary to his old cell.
“Is the poor man really dead?” inquired the priest.
“Dead as a pickled herring, your reverence.”
“And without confession!—unhappy man!”
And the good priest knelt upon the cold flag stones and prayed with fervour for the soul of the deceased mendicant.
Next day the wealthy owner of the mansion was reclining in an easy chair, his tortured limbs writhing with agony on the cushions of down by which they were supported. His physician in attendance was seated near him.
“I find myself worse to-day, doctor: I am weaker than I have yet been, and I feel something which I cannot well define.”
“At your age, my dear sir, and in your state of health,” the physician replied, “you must seek amusement for your mind. I have always told you that solitude is baneful to you. You should send for some members of your own family, or get some devoted friend to come and live with you.”
“Family! devoted friend! Why, you well know, doctor, that collaterals are mere heirs; you are in their way whilst you live: they only wait to prey upon your soil after your death.”
“But had you never any children?” the doctor asked.
“Never,” replied his patient, after some hesitation. “And I have no relations.”
Here the unhappy old man sighed, his brow became clouded, and he seemed to writhe in mental agony. Suddenly, by an apparent effort, changing the conversation, and assuming a tone of unconcern—
“Well, doctor,” he said, “and so this scoundrel of a mendicant, who, you may be assured, wanted to murder, and afterwards rob me, died yesterday in the prison hospital.”
“No, not in the hospital,” replied the physician. “I did all I could to induce him to remain in the infirmary; but he refused, and even solicited, as a favour, to be taken back to the cell he occupied before his trial.”
“You see then, doctor, what a villain he was. I suppose he felt remorse for the crime he intended to commit in this house. Did he make any avowal? Is any thing known of his family?”
“Nothing, except that he was an illegitimate child, and was found, shortly after his birth, under the peristyle of St. Louis’ church.”
“St. Louis’ church?”
“Yes: and he was taken to the Foundling Hospital in the Rue du Plessis.”
“The Rue du Plessis?”
“Yes: he told me the whole story the day before yesterday, at my evening visit to the prison infirmary. He had carefully preserved an old card, upon which were traced some strange characters, and an engraved stone belonging to a seal. He requested me to take charge of them. I believe they are still in my pocket-book. Yes, here they are. This stone must have belonged to a valuable trinket—he probably sold the setting. Here is the card.”
The old invalid, whose increasing agitation had not been observed by the doctor, threw a rapid glance over these objects,—then, with a shriek of horror, sunk back upon his chair.
“Great God,” he exclaimed, “the mendicant was my son!”
A few minutes after, this unnatural parent had ceased to breathe.
THE BAPTISM OF POCAHONTAS.
ON THE PICTURE IN THE ROTUNDA AT WASHINGTON.
Sweet, gentle girl! in holy meekness bending,
Though of a wilder race and darker hue;
Etherial light is on thy soul descending,
Loveliest of wild flowers! like thy native dew.
Seen in the struggling of that heaving breast,
The quivering lip—the downward, fawn-like eye,
The strange, deep penitence that will not rest,
That gushes tears, and vents the swelling sigh.
From thy dark shades of superstitious lore,
Thou com’st arrayed in purest vestal white,
That he, the man of God, might on thee pour
Jordan’s still wave, to give thy blindness sight;
And to that heart, where hath been deeply stealing,
The fading bloom of earth’s bright flowery way,
A brighter—far enduring bliss revealing,
In the pure path of Truth’s eternal ray.
Bound in the rapture that thy beauty lendeth,
Thy pale-face lover at thy lonely side,
Holdeth with silent joy the book that blendeth
Life and life’s hope—its comfort and its guide.
Breathing in his warm look the bliss that springing—
The pure, bright thoughts that thrill his yearning breast,
The golden visions that around are flinging,
Their airy spells of future love and rest.
But there is one upon the ground reposing,
With curious gaze, yet wild, irreverent air,
Whose fallen deer-skin her full charms disclosing,
With beaded arms, and crimson braided hair,
Declares her kindred to thy own wild race,
The swift-foot wanderer of thy early day;
When by Powhatan’s stream thy footstep’s trace
Told, where like fawns ye frolick’d in your play.
And one, in beauty of majestic form,
Who stands erect, with scorn like lightning’s gleam
Darting from eyes as black as ebon-storm,
When midnight revels with its vivid beam—
Who will not brook a sister’s sacred vow,
The solemn faith, the strange baptismal rite—
Who will not bend in holy praise, or bow,
When in deep prayer the list’ning throng unite.
Oh! in this hour, while angels’ harps are swelling,
The rich rejoicing of the upper skies,
While the sweet anthem of the earth is telling
That one crush’d wild flower ’neath the altar lies.
Would that a ray, from that pure shrine descending,
Might pierce the darkness of thy forest kind—
Lighting a pathway that to thee is lending
Thy surest hope the spirit-home to find.
A. F. H.
THE REEFER OF ’76.
———
BY THE “AUTHOR OF CRUIZING IN THE LAST WAR.”
———