De L'Orme. / The Works of G. P. R. James, Esq., Vol. XVI.

by G. P. R. James

"You have done wrong, my daughter," said he, turning to the Countess with an air of authority, which she bore more meekly than might have been expected. "Mildness wins hearts, while unkindness can but break them. Leave me with this young gentleman, and I doubt not soon to restore him to himself."

The Countess did as he bade her, without reply; and desiring her women to bring her embroidery frame, she left the apartment. The bleeding had instantly relieved me. Every drop that flowed had seemed so much taken from an oppressive load that overburdened my heart; and when the old man sat down by me, and asked if I was better, I could answer him in the affirmative, and thank him for his assistance.

"I will not attempt to console you, my son," he proceeded, "for you have met with a deep and irreparable loss. From all I hear, your mother was one of the best and most amiable of women; and through a long life, we meet with so very few on whom our hearts can fix, that every time death numbers one of them for his own, he leaves a deep and irremediable wound with us, that none but Time can assuage, and Time himself ought never wholly to heal. I know, too, at the moment when we find that fate has put its immoveable barrier between us and those we loved--when the cold small portal of the grave is shut against our communion with our friends--I know that it is then that every pain we have given them is visited with double anguish upon our own hearts, and a crowd of bitter, unavailing regrets fills every way of memory with dark and horrible forms."

I wept bitterly, for he had touched a chord to which my feelings vibrated but too sensitively. "In the gaieties of life," he proceeded, "in the pleasures of society, in the passions, the interests, the desires of human existence and of our earthly nature, we often forget those finer feelings--those better, brighter, nobler sentiments, which belong to the soul alone. Nor is it till irretrievable is stamped upon our actions, that we truly feel where we have been wanting in duty, in gratitude, in affection; but when we do feel it, we ought to have a care not to let those regrets pass away in vain tears and ineffectual sorrow, thus wasting the most blessed remedy that Heaven has given to the diseases of the soul. On the contrary, we should apply them to our future conduct, and by gathering instruction from the past, and improvement from remorse, should find in the chastisement of Heaven the blessing it was intended to be."

As I recovered from the first shock of the tidings I had just heard, I had time to consider more particularly the person who spoke to me. As I have said, he was an old man; and, from the perfect silver of his hair and beard, I should have supposed him above seventy; but the erectness of his carriage, the whiteness of his teeth, and the pure undimmed fire of his eye, took much from his look of age. His dress, though it consisted of a long black robe, was certainly not clerical; and from the skill with which he had bled me, I was rather inclined to suppose that his profession tended more towards the cure of bodies than of souls.

In reply to his mild homily, which appeared to me, notwithstanding the gentleness of his language, to point at greater errors than any I could charge myself with towards the parent I had lost, I could only answer, that it was hardly possible for a being made up of human weakness to be so continually brought in connection with another, as a son must be with a mother, without falling into some faults towards her; but that even now, when memory and affection joined to magnify all I had done amiss in regard to the dead, I could recall no instance in which I had intentionally given her pain.

An explanation ensued; and I found that my mother, when on her death-bed, had written to the Countess de Soissons, informing her of my disappearance from Bigorre, and attributing it to love for the daughter of a roturier in the vicinity, who had also quitted the province shortly after. She gave no name and no description; but she begged the Countess de Soissons to cause search to be made for me in Paris, and to endeavour to rescue me from the debasing connection into which, she said, the blood of Bigorre should have held me from ever entering.

"It is under these circumstances," proceeded the old man, "that the princess addressed you this morning with the abrupt news of your mother's death, hoping by the remorse which that news would occasion, to win you at once from the unhappy entanglement into which you have fallen."

"That the Countess de Soissons should be mistaken," replied I, "does not surprise me, for she did not know me; but that my mother should suppose any passion, whether worthy or unworthy, would have led me to inflict so much pain upon her, and on my father, as my unexplained absence must have done, does astonish and afflict me. Indeed, though my own death might have been the consequence of my stay, I was weak to fly as I did; nor should I have done so, had my mind been in a state to judge sanely of my own conduct. Will you, sir, have the goodness to inform the Countess de Soissons that the suspicions of my mother were entirely unfounded, and that I neither fled with any one, nor for the purpose of meeting any one, as she must evidently see, from my having found and attached myself to Monsieur le Comte. My absence, sir, was occasioned by my having accidentally slain one of my fellow-creatures, and my having no means of proving that I did so accidentally."

"It has been a most unhappy mistake," replied the old man, "for undoubtedly it has been this idea that wounded your mother to the heart. But I hurt you; do not let me do so. If it has been a mistake, you are no way answerable for it. I now go to give your message to the Countess, and will bring you a few lines addressed to you from your mother, but which, you must remember, were written under erroneous feelings."