Before the conclusion of this little exordium John had become perfectly unconscious; and, at its termination, mechanically shook the hand of his interlocutor, while he took his departure. All the communication that he could comprehend, was, that it was intended to dispel all the bright illusions love's fancy had conjured in his mind. All his momentary visions of prospective happiness were swept away, like the misty canopy of the mountain before the morning breeze. His ariel palaces of imaginative grandeur, lay shattered at his feet; and he stood like the last of a defeated host, viewing destruction and desolation around him. His fondest hopes were blighted; he felt as one robbed of his very soul; he was wretched and dejected, and turned from the spot with the feelings of an outcast, an alien; or as a once powerful courtier, removed from the presence of his sovereign, to a perpetual expatriation. Strawberry Hill had for ever lost its interest to him; the only treasure it contained held out no prospect of possession. In his heart there was a blank, which nothing short of his idol could fill; but it was empty, and seared; and vacant was his mind, and miserable his feelings, as he leisurely journeyed on his way to Fern Vale. They were, in fact, such as can be better imagined than described; and when he reached his station, and delivered his horse to one of his men in silence, he went about his usual vocations as one almost destitute of reason.
What the feelings of the lady most concerned were, had they been consulted, we can well understand; but we must refrain from indulging in anticipations. The manner of John's leave-taking, had struck, with no little amazement, all those who saw him. Mrs. Rainsfield was the one, who, conjecturing its cause, could best appreciate his feelings; she pitied him, and secretly determined, that if he and Eleanor were to be for ever separated, it should not be for want of strategy on her part. She felt that not only his happiness, but the girl's too, depended upon their union; and she considered her husband had taken too strict a notion of the engagement with Smithers, who, she believed, thought very little of it: therefore, Mrs. Rainsfield concluded, very little manœuvring would break it off; and so determined to devote her energies to such a consummation.
CHAPTER VIII.
"Pray if you know Where in the purlieus of this forest stands A sheep cote?" As You Like It, Act 4, Sc. 3.
That portion of the year to which we now bring our narrative is, without exception, the finest period of Australian seasons; when the temperature is the acme of salubrity, and the climate, generally, as delightful as can be imagined. We speak of the spring when merging into the early summer, and when the cool freshness of the morning breeze tempers the genial warmth of the mid-day sun; which had acquired just sufficient strength in his rays to impart a pleasant heat without oppressiveness. On such a morning, then, when the vast concave of the heavens, expanded in a perfectly spotless azure sky (such as in our foggy isle is never seen); and with the freshness of the bush developing its verdure in the odorous exudations of floriferous plants, and the blithesome exuberance of the songless denizens of nature's nemoral aviary; William took his departure on the mission we have detailed in the last chapter.
He journeyed on for days, singly but not lonely; for his heart was inspired by the lambent fragrance of nature's smile; and he felt not the solitude of the road, as he travelled over the vast expanse of the Darling Downs. He had traversed this vast table-land, and was approaching its eastern margin, where the descent was to be made to the coast country, when he began to experience an oppressiveness in the atmosphere, which he knew portended a storm. He, however, continued his course, though, indeed, he had no option, until, as the sun was approaching the meridian, he entered the deep gorge called Cunningham's Gap, through which the road passed to the low country, and looked anxiously at the lowering aspect of the sky. He felt he might make up his mind for a drenching in the approaching storm, which he perceived would soon burst over his head; and only exerted himself to get through "the Gap" into open land, before it commenced.
Cunningham's Gap, or, as for the sake of brevity it is generally called, "the Gap," is situated between fifty and sixty miles from the coast; and is, as its name would imply, a defile in the mountains, affording a convenient passage through the "main range;" or more properly speaking, a descent from the table-land of the Darling Downs to the country below. The descent effected by this pass is between two and three thousand feet; and the view obtained in the passage of the low lying country is beautiful in the extreme. The gorge itself is one of those combinations of the picturesque and sublime with the useful; and viewed as a specimen of scenery, it is surpassingly grand. Looking at it in its ascent, where its two stupendous sides raise their gigantic masses in rocky precipices, upwards of two thousand feet high; which seem to frown upon the bold traveller who ventures within their cavernous precincts; one cannot contemplate the vast fissure other than as the work of a beneficent providence, as a gateway in the otherwise insurmountable "range."
William Ferguson had entered the "Gap," and was riding down the declivity at a rapid rate, when the sky became still more overcast, and the clouds gathered in quick succession; while the low fulminating of the distant thunder, and the death-like stillness of the defile, indicated the speedy approach of the storm, and imparted a solemnity to the scene. The thunder became more distinct. The lightning flashed in vivid darts, which seemed to play along the sides of the pass, until the attractive adamant deviated the refrangible fluid; which then buried itself in some deep crevice of the pendent rocks. A few heavy drops of rain then fell to the earth, and were speedily succeeded by a deluge, which was driven on the face of a tempest almost irresistible. Still on sped the rider almost carried on the wings of the storm; until he was relieved from any pressing anxiety by emerging on the plain; while the elemental warfare raged with unabated fury.