‘Fast roll the chariot wheels of Time. HE comes!
The Spirit and the Bride expectant wait,—
Even so come, Lord Jesus! Saviour—come!’
CHAPTER XIII
VARIOUS CHARACTERISTICS
In the last few chapters we have had glimpses of Charlotte Tucker’s life rather from within than from without; chiefly in reference to her successive losses, and her own feelings connected with those losses or with passing events. Now we will try to obtain a few glimpses of her, rather from without than from within; to see her as others saw her, not so much as she saw herself. I do not for a moment mean to imply that the two views must be antagonistic. The view of a castle from within and the view of that same castle from without are totally different; yet they are not in the least antagonistic. The one is as true as the other.
In doing this it has to be remembered that A. L. O. E. was a many-sided and to some extent a complex nature. Hers was not a character to be lightly sketched in a dozen lines. Probably no character of any human being can be satisfactorily so disposed of; and there are complexities in the very simplest nature. But the main outlines of some people are more easily perceived, more ‘consistent’ according to popular notions of character-consistency, than the main outlines of some other people; merely because they happen to embrace fewer opposites. There were a good many opposites in the character of Charlotte Tucker.
All people did not see her exactly alike,—partly because of necessity they looked upon her with different eyes, and partly because of necessity she was not the same in her manifestations to all of them. Being a many-sided individual, one side of her became prominent to one person, another side became prominent to another person. While one friend remembers vividly her spirit of ardent devotion, and another recalls especially her work among the poor, a third pictures her sparkling conversation, a fourth her spirited games of play with children. While one has the strongest impression of her resolute sternness, her horror of evil and self-indulgence, another cannot speak warmly enough of her intense unselfishness and her unlimited kindness, and yet another smiles over the remembrance of her irrepressible fun. All these things were included in her; but naturally not all these things were equally apparent at all times, or to everybody who knew her.
Nor need it be supposed that Charlotte Tucker was a being all light, with no shadows. She was thoroughly human. There were shadows of course,—what else could one expect?—and she had many and many a hard fight, not in girlhood only, but all through life, to overcome her faults.