But deep this truth impress’d my mind—
Thro’ all his works abroad,
The heart benevolent and kind
The most resembles God.—Burns.
HE sun had set upon the last evening of a cold and bleak December, and from the frosty sky, a few stars looked down upon the crowded streets of one of the largest towns in England; a motley scene, in which the actors, both gay and sorrowful, went whirling and winding onwards, altogether unconscious of other scrutiny than from the busy eyes of their fellows. It was still early, and the whole scrambling restless world of the great town was astir, pouring out its many-tongued din over the cheerful pavements, bright with the light from its open shops and warehouses, and throwing its wide stream, in ceaseless and ever-spreading volumes, through street and lane and alley. Working men were hastening homewards, with baskets of tools slung over their stalwart shoulders, and empty pitchers dangling “at the cold finger’s end.” Dignified merchants, lean men of arts and letters, spruce commercial gentlemen, blended among each other like ripples in a river. Here there was an eddy, where the stream, branching out, swept off in another direction; there a whirlpool, where the flood pouring in, from a world of converging ways, involved itself for a moment in mazy bewilderment, before it found its purposed channel once more: but everywhere there was the same full and incessant flow, bearing in its broad bosom the unfailing concomitants of loud-voiced mirth and secret misery, of anger and of peacefulness, poverty and wealth, apathy and ambition, which marked its stream for human.
It is not with these many-voiced brilliant streets we have to do to-night, but with a household in one of them. A very quiet house you may see it is, though not a gloomy one, for light is shining from the yet uncurtained windows, pleasant thoughtful cheering fire-light, and the room has about it the indefinable comfort and brightness of home. It has at present but one occupant, and she—there is nothing about her appearance at all extraordinary—she is not very young—not less than thirty summers have past over those grave and thoughtful features, and given experience to the quiet intelligence of those clear eyes—nor beautiful, though those who knew it, loved to look upon her face, and thought there was there something higher than beauty. You would not think, to see her now, how blithe her nature was, and how unusual this sadness; but she is sorrowful to-night. It may be, that in her cheerful out-goings and in-comings, she has not time to indulge in any sad recollections, but that they have overcome her, in such a quiet evening hour as this. The shadows are gathering thicker and deeper, and the windows of neighbouring houses are all bright, but this room retains its twilight still. Its solitary tenant leans her head upon her hand, and gazes into the vacant air, as though she sought for some retiring figure and found it not. And why may she not be sad? She is a Christian thoughtful and pure-minded, and the last hours of another year are wearing themselves away, and is there no food for sadness here?
But there are voices that breathe no sorrow nor sadness coming in through the half-open door. There is one, a sweet indefinite tone, which speaks half of childhood, and half of graver years; there is boisterous rejoicing and obstreperous boyishness in another, and there is a grave voice, as joyful, but deep and quiet; and, here they come, each one more mirthful than the other. There is a sprightly girl of some fifteen summers, a youth her proud superior by two undoubted twelvemonths, and an elder brother, whose maturer features bear a yet more striking resemblance to the silent sister, the eldest of them all, about whose ears a storm of fun and reproof comes rattling down.
“Christian had no time!” says the sage wisdom of seventeen; “yet here is grave Christian dreaming away her hours in the dim fire-light.”
“You were too busy, Christian, to go out with me,” remonstrates little Mary—for the endearing caressing epithet “little,” though often protested against, was still in use in the household—“and you are doing nothing now.”
But Christian only smiles: strange it seems, that Christian should smile so sadly!
Now the youthful tongues are loosed. They have been on an important visit: to-morrow is to see that grave and blushing brother the master of another house, and that house has this night been subjected to the admiration and criticism of the younger members of the family, and all they have seen and wondered at must needs be told now for Christian’s information; but the elder sister listens with vacant inattentive ear, and irresponsive eye, until Robert grows indignant, and protests with boyish fervour, that “It’s a shame for her to be so grave and sad, and James going to be married to-morrow!” James, the bridegroom, does not however seem to think so, for he checks his youthful brother, and bends over Christian tenderly, and Christian’s eyes grow full, and tears hang on the long lashes. What can make Christian so sad? Let us go with her to her chamber, and we shall see.
It is a quiet airy pleasant room, rich enough to please even an Oxford scholar of the olden time, for there are more than “twenty books clothed in black and red” within its restricted space. There is one windowed corner, at which, in the summer time, the setting sun streams in, and for this cause Christian has chosen it, as the depository of her treasures. There is a portrait hanging on the wall; a mild apostolic face, with rare benignity in its pensive smile, and genius stamped upon its pale and spiritual forehead: too pale, alas! and spiritual; for the first glance tells you, that the original can no longer be in the land of the living. A little table stands below it, covered with books—a few old volumes worthy to be laid beneath the word of truth—and there too lies a Bible. It has a name upon it, and a far-past date, and its pages tell of careful perusal, and its margin is rich with written comments, and brief, yet clear, and forcible remarks. Below the name, a trembling hand has marked another date—you can see it is this day five years—and a text, “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, for they have entered into their rest, and their works do follow them.” The faltering hand was that of Christian Melville, and thus you have the story of her sadness. This place is the favourite sanctuary of that subdued and chastened spirit; a holy trysting-place, that has been filled often with a presence greater than that of earthly king or lord, and Christian is always happy here, even though—yea, verily, because—she does sit among these relics of a bygone time, of youthful hopes and expectations which long ago have come to an end and passed away for ever.