Here then was it where we chose our heritage, and here we have since remained, but everything is changed since then. Many an aged brow has passed from earth, and many a bright eye closed in death. Every trace of old is passing away, save where their shadows glide in the memory. Even the grave where Ella slept is gone from earth.
Twenty years after her death I made a pilgrimage to the place—the young sapling pines which shaded it had grown to lofty trees—human voice seemed never to have broken in tones of joy or woe the deep solitude around—the long grass waved rank and dark above the walls we had raised, and the red berries hung rich and ripe by the ruined hearthstone. Again, when another twenty years passed, I came to it once more—the weight of age had gathered o'er me, but there lay the buried sunlight of my youth, and the spirit thoughts of other days drew me to it. Again there was a change—a change which told me my own time drew near. The woods were gone long since—the reaper had passed o'er the lowly graves, and knew them not. The last record of my love and of my woe, was gone. Dwellings were raised along the lonely beach, and laden ships floated on the long silent waters. I bade the place farewell for ever, and returned to await in peace and hope my summons to the promised rest.
The old man paused—the dreams of the past had weakened him, and he retired for the night. Next morn we waited long for his presence, but he came not. We sought his chamber, and found him dead. The soul had passed away—one hand was folded on his heart, and oh! the might of earthly love. It clasped a shining braid of silken hair, and something, of which their faint perfume told to be the faded rose leaves—frail memorials of his fondly loved Ella, but lasting after the warm heart which cherished them was cold. He was gone where, if it be not in heaven "a crime to love too well," his spirit may yet meet with her's, in that holy light, whose purity of bliss may not be broken by the vain turmoil of earthly feelings. So ends the story of uncle Ethel.
Well, said Grace, after we had discussed Ethel's melancholy story, although I don't believe in ghosts, I cannot do away with my faith in dreams, and last night I had a most disagreeable one, which disturbed me much. I thought I had engaged my passage, and when I unclosed my purse to pay down the money, nothing was in it but a plain gold ring and a ruby heart. My money was gone, and, oh! the grief I felt was deeper than waking language can describe. Then, Grace, said I, you must receive consolation for your disagreeable dream, in the words of your own favourite song, "Rory o'More," that dreams always go by contrary you know, and so I shall read your dream. The plain gold ring means that tie, which, like it, has no ending. The heart has, in all ages, been held symbolical of its holiest feeling, and thus unite love and marriage, and your sorrow will be turned to joy. So I prognosticate your dream to mean. And time told I had foretold aright—for soon after we had arrived in St. John's, the entrance to which, from the main river, is extremely beautiful, showing every variety of scenery, from the green meadows of rich intervale, where stand white dwellings and orchard trees, to the grey and barren rocks, with cedary plumage towering to the sky.
Grace having engaged her passage home, we were turning from the office, when a stranger bounded to us, and caught her by the hand. Grace Marley, he exclaimed—my own, my beautiful. I felt her lean heavily on my arm; she had fainted. And so deep was that trance, we fancied she was gone—but joy rarely kills, and she awoke to the passionate exclamations of her lover—for such he was, come o'er the deep sea to seek her. An explanation ensued. Their letters to each other had all miscarried. None had been received by either. (All this bitter disappointment, however, happened before the establishment of our post.) So Grace, instead of returning to Ireland, was wedded next day, her husband having brought means with him to settle in the country. The magician, Love, flung his rose-light o'er her path, and, when I saw her last, she fancied the emerald glades of Oromot, where her home now lay, almost as beautiful as those by the blue lakes of Killarney, in the land of her birth.
With the end of September commence the night frosts. The woods now lose their greenness; and the most brilliant hues of crimson, and gold, and purple, are flung in gorgeous flakes of beauty over their boughs, as though each leaf were crystal, and reflected and retained the light of some glorious sunset. In this lovely season, which is most appropriately termed the fall, we wished to get along with our church, and have it enclosed before the winter. This was rather an arduous undertaking in young settlement like ours; but there were those here who loved
"Old England's holy church,
And loved her form of prayer right well."
And liberally they came forward to raise a temple to their faith in the wilderness. The "Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Lands" had promised assistance; but the frame must first be erected and enclosed ere it could be claimed. In this country cash is a most scarce commodity, and many species of speculation are made with the aid of little real specie. Large sums are spoken of, but rarely appear bodily: and our church got on in the same way. The owner of the saw-mill signed twenty pounds as his subscription towards it, and paid it in boards—the carpenters who did the work received from the subscribers pork and flour for their pay—and our neighbour, the embarrassed lumber-man, who was still wooden-headed enough to like anything of a timber spec, got out the frame by contract, himself giving most generously five pounds worth of work towards it. And thus the church was raised, and now it stands, with white spire, pointing heavenward, above the ancient forest trees.
As winter was now approaching, how to pass its long evenings agreeably and rationally was a question which was agitated. The dwellers of America are more enlightened now than in those old times when dancing and feasting were the sole amusements, so a library was instituted and formed by the same means as the church had been—a load of potatoes, or a barrel of buckwheat, being given by each party to purchase books with. The selection of these, to suit all tastes, was a matter of some difficulty, the grave and serious declaiming against light reading, and regarding a novel as the climax of human wickedness. One old lady, who by the way was fond of reading, and had studied the ancient tale of Pamela regularly, at her leisure, for the last forty years, was the strongest against these, and, on being told that her favourite tome was no less than a novel, she consigned it to oblivion, and seemed, for a time, to have lost all faith in sublunary things. After some little trouble, however, the thing was satisfactorily arranged. Even here, to this lone nook of the western world, had reached the fame of the Caxtons of modern times. Aught that bore the name of Chambers, had a place in our collection, and the busy fingers of the little Edinburgh 'devils' have brightened the solitude of many a home on the banks of the Washedemoak.