"No," said the Pastor, "the young man she alludes to is the son of her elder sister, now in a better world. His father, you doubtless know; the Baron de Ripperda."
"I have not been in Spain these ten years," replied the Marquis; "but I know the Baron is now there; and introducing plans of internal policy, worthy the emulation of his own times, and the gratitude of future ages.—Before happy circumstances restored him to Spain, it was never my good fortune to meet him in any of my accidental visits to the Netherlands."
Mr. Athelstone and his noble guest continued their discourse on the public history of the Baron de Ripperda. Remarking, with some loyal animadversions, on his father Don Juan de Montemar Duke de Ripperda, who, in resentment for some slight from his sovereign, left Spain for the Netherlands; and, joining himself to the United States, exchanged his Spanish rank for that of a northern baron.—While the Marquis regretted that his son, the present illustrious Ripperda, had ever belonged to any other country than that of his ancestors, he expatiated with the pride of a Spaniard on the talents which were now reclaimed by their parent land. Mr. Athelstone, who had all the old-fashioned notions respecting amor patriæ, rejoined that the satisfactory accomplishment of Baron de Ripperda's mission as ambassador from the Netherlands to Madrid, had empowered him to resign with honour his bonds to their country; and to resume his hereditary rights in Spain in the manner best calculated to re-establish his house, and to transmit the ancient glories of his family.
While the Pastor and his guest were engaged in this conversation, Ferdinand leaned exhausted in his chair; and had leisure to survey the domestic scene around him; so different from the solitude he had anticipated in the condemned cell of the heretic Cura of the island!—From the window of the room in which he now sat, still issued the light he had seen from afar; and which had beaconed his weary steps to his present comfortable station by its source; a cheerful fire, and a cluster of blazing candles on its chimney-piece.
Ferdinand could not have been so long in Italy without forming a taste in architecture; and he contemplated with admiring curiosity this specimen of Gothic workmanship. It was of a cinque-foil shape, supported by short columns on brackets, and adorned with a projecting frieze, on which stood the lighted branches, with alabaster vases full of autumnal flowers. It appeared to have been translated from some building of older date; and, indeed, little more than a century before, this very arch had mantled the Abbot's hearth in the good monastery of Lindisfarne.
Ferdinand next looked at the oak-pannelled walls of the room, enlivened by a range of fine portraits in carved ebony frames. These, with a cabinet of curious china, a harpsichord, a well-stored bookcase, and the usual complement of sofas and chairs, completed the furniture. He did not take so cursory a view of its inhabitants. The venerable master of the house sat on one side of the fire-place, talking with the Marquis. His silvered hair and benign countenance, blanched and worn by seventy winters, seemed to announce how nearly the divine spirit within had shaken off its earthly tabernacle. The Marquis had never before regarded an avowed minister of the Reformation, without a distance in his manner that proclaimed I am near pollution! but now he sat listening to the Pastor with so cordial an air, that Ferdinand murmured to himself; "Ah! my father, it is too late for your unhappy son, should your present feelings towards that good man, indeed, draw away the only prejudice from your noble heart!" He sighed heavily, and turned his attention to the other side of the room.
The sisters had withdrawn their chairs far from the fire-side circle, and were plying their needles with indefatigable diligence. Cornelia's raven hair was braided back from her polished brow, and confined in a knot with a gold bodkin. The majestic contour of her features suited well with her Roman name; and the simplicity of the plain white garment in which she was arrayed, harmonized with the modest dignity of a figure, which proclaimed in every movement that the nobility of the soul needs no foreign ornament! As her fair hand traversed the embroidery frame, Ferdinand turned from these lofty beauties, to the gentle Alice; whose charms, if of a feebler, were of a subtler force. Her head, which moved about rather oftener than her sister's, in search of silk, scissors, and needles, gave free scope to the contemplation of the young Spaniard. She appeared several years younger than Cornelia. Her form was fairy in its proportions; slight, airy, and apparently impalpable to aught but the touch of a sylph. Her azure eyes, glancing around for what she sought, shone so lucidly bright from under her flaxen locks, that Ferdinand thought he had never seen eyes so beautiful; "Never," said he to himself, "so divinely innocent; never so irresistibly exhilarating."
He continued to gaze, till some bitter recollections caused him to cover his eyes with his hand; but soon withdrawing it, he looked again upon Alice; and longed to hear her speak, while a sudden self-gratulation on how fluently he could himself discourse in English, animated his before languid features. He observed her turn her head towards the yet uncurtained window. The moon was now holding her bright course in the heavens, without meeting the passing shadow of a single cloud. He seized the opportunity to address the sisters, and remarked the beauty of the night.
"It is calmer than usual, after so tempestuous a day," observed Cornelia.