Elsewhere these three years might have wrought strange changes, but they made few in good old Burnfield. The old, never-ending, but ever new routine of births, and deaths, and marriages went on; children were growing up to be men and women—there were no young ladies and gentlemen in Burnfield—and other children were taking their place. The only marked change was the introduction of a railway, that brought city people to the quiet sea-coast town every summer, and gave a sort of impetus to the stagnating business of the place. Very dazzling and bewildering to the eyes of the sober-going Burnfieldians were those dashing city folks, who condescended to patronize them with a lofty superiority quite overwhelming.
One other change these three years had wrought—the girl Georgia was a woman in looks and stature, the handsome, haughty, capricious belle of Burnfield. Time had passed unmarked by any incident worth mentioning. Life was rather monotonous in that little sea-shore cottage, and Georgia might have stagnated with the rest but for the fiery life in her heart that would never be at rest long enough to suffer her to fall into a lethargy.
Georgia's physical and mental education had been rapidly progressing during these three years. She could manage a boat with the best oarsman in Burnfield; and often, when the winds were highest and the sea roughest, her light skiff—a gift from an admirer—might be seen dancing on the waters like a sea-gull, with the tall, slight form of a young girl guiding it through the foam, her wild black eyes lit up with the excitement of the moment, looking like some ocean goddess, or the queen of the storm riding the tempest she had herself raised.
Georgia braved all dangers because they brought her excitement, and she would have lived in a constant fever if she could; danger sent the hot blood bounding through her veins like quicksilver, and fear was a feeling unknown to her high and daring temperament. So when the typhus fever once, a year previously, raged through the town, carrying off hundreds, and every one fled in terror, she braved it all, entered every house where it appeared in its most malignant form, braved storm, and night, and danger to nurse the pest-stricken, and became the guardian-angel of the town. And this—not, reader, from any high and holy motive, not from that heavenly charity, that inspires the heroic Sister of Charity to do likewise—but simply because there was excitement in it, because she was fearless for herself and exulted in her power at that moment, and perhaps, to do Georgia justice, she was urged by a humane feeling of pity for the neglected sufferers. She watched by the dead and dying, she boldly entered lazar houses where no one else would tread, and she did not take the disease. Her high, perfect bodily health, her fine organization and utter fearlessness, were her safeguards. Georgia had already obtained a sort of mastery over the townfolks; that deference was paid to her that simple minds always pay to lofty ones; but now her power was complete. She reigned among them a crowned queen; the dark-eyed, handsome girl had obtained a mastery over them she could never lose; she had only to raise her finger to have them come at her beck; she was beginning to realize her childish dream of power, and she triumphed in it. And so, free, wild, glad, and untamed, the young conqueress reigned, queen of the forest and river, and a thousand human hearts; looked up to, as comets are—something to admire and wonder at, at a respectful distance.
Under the auspices of Father Murray her education had progressed rapidly. As his congregation was not very numerous, his labors were not very arduous, and he found a good deal of spare time for himself. Being a profound scholar, he determined to devote himself to the education of his little niece Emily, and at her solicitation Georgia also became his pupil. Poor, simple, happy little Emily was speedily outstripped and left far behind by her gifted companion, who mastered every science with a rapidity and ease really wonderful. By nature she was a decided linguist, and learned French, and German, and Latin with a quickness that delighted the heart of good Father Murray. All the religious training the wild girl had ever received in her life was imbibed now, but even yet it was only superficial; it just touched the surface of her sparkling nature, nothing sunk in. She professed no particular faith; she believed in no formal creed; she worshiped the Lord of the mighty sea and the beautiful earth, the ruler of the storm and king of the universe, in a wild, strange, exultant way of her own, but she looked upon all professed creeds as so many trammels that no one with an independent will could ever submit to. Ah! it was Georgia's hour of highest earthly happiness then; she did not know how the heart of all atheists, infidels, and heretics cry out involuntarily to that merciful All Father in their hour of sorrow. Georgia was as one who "having eyes saw not, having ears heard not." In the summer time of youth, and health, and happiness she would not believe, and it was only like many others when the fierce wintry tempest beat on her unsheltered head, when the dark night of utter anguish closed around her, she fell at the feet of Him who "doeth all things well," offering not a fresh, unworldly heart, but one crushed, and rent, and consumed to calcined ashes in the red heat of her own fiery passions.
Georgia rarely went to church; her place of worship was the dark solemn, old primeval forest, where, lying under the trees, listening to the drowsy twittering of the birds for her choir, she would dream her wild, rainbow-tinted visions of a future more glorious than this earth ever realized. Ah! the dreams of eighteen!
It was a wild, blusterous afternoon in early spring, a dark, dry, windy day. Miss Jerusha, the same old cast-iron vestal as of yore, sat in the best room, knitting away, just as you and I, reader, first saw her on Christmas Eve five years ago, just looking as if five minutes instead of years had passed since then, so little change is there in her own proper person or in that awe-inspiring apartment, the best room. The asthmatic rocking-chair seems to have been attacked with rheumatism since, for its limbs are decidedly of a shaky character, and its consumptive wheeze, as it saws back or forward, betokens that its end is approaching. Curled up at her feet lies that intelligent quadruped, Betsey Periwinkle, gazing with blinking eyes in the fire, and deeply absorbed in her own reflections. A facetious little gray-and-white kitten (Betsey's youngest), is amusing itself running round and round in a frantic effort to catch its own little shaving-brush of a tail, varying the recreation by making desperate dives at Miss Jerusha's ball of stocking yarn, and invariably receives a kick in return that sends it flying across the room, but which doesn't seem to disturb its equanimity much. Out in the kitchen that small "cullud pusson," Fly, is making biscuits for supper, and diffusing around her a most delightful odor of good things. Miss Jerusha sits silently knitting for a long time with pursed-up lips, only glancing up now and then when an unusually high blast makes the little homestead shake, but at last the spirit moves her, and she speaks:
"It's abominable! it's disgraceful! the neglect of parents nowadays! letting their young 'uns run into all sorts of danger, and without no insurance on 'em neither. If that there little chap was mine, I'd switch him within an inch of his life afore I'd let him carry on with such capers. He'll be drowned just as sure as shootin', and sarve him right, too, a venturesome, fool-hardy little limb! You, Fly!"
Miss Jerusha's voice has lost none of its shrillness and sharpness under the mollifying influence of Old Father Time.