"Dinna speak that way, faither," cried Effie, lifting up her hands; "I canna stand that. You said ye wadna force me, an' ye are forcin me. Oh, my puir heart, wha or what will support ye when grief for my parents turns me against ye? Faither, faither, when I am dead, Laird Cherrytrees will be again yer friend. A little time will do't: will ye no wait?"
"Hunger waits only eight days, as the sayin is," replied he, "an ye'll live mair than that time, I hope an' trow. I will be dead afore ye, Effie, an' ye'll hae the consolation, as ye maybe drap a tear on the mossy grey stane that covers the Mearnses i' the kirkyard o' our parish, to think, if ye shouldna like to say, in case ye micht be heard—though thinkin an' speakin's a' ane to God—that 'that stane was lifted ten years suner than it micht hae been, because I liked Lewie Campbell better than auld Laird Cherrytrees.'"
"An' it's no likely," said the mother, "that I wad be there to hear Effie mak sae waefu a speech. If I binna lyin wi' the Mearns, I'll be wi' the Cherrytrees o' Mossnook—nae relations o' the Burnbanks, though maybe as guid a family. But, afore I'm mixed wi' the dust o' that auld hoose, Effie—an' it mayna be lang—ye may join the twa Cherrytrees, an' let the gravestanes o' the Mearns, as weel as the Mossnooks, lie yet a score years langer withoot bein moved. It's a pity to disturb the lang grass. Its sough i' the nichtwind keeps the bats frae pickin the auld banes, an' maybe it may save yer mother's, if ye send her there afore her time."
Effie's feelings could no longer withstand these appeals. Her sobbing ceased suddenly; and, starting up from her seat, she looked to the old clock that stood against the wall of the cottage. She noticed that it was upon the hour of the Laird's usual visit.
"It is twelve o'clock, faither," she said, firmly—"this hoor decides the fate o' Effie Mearns."
Walking to the door, she placed herself in the position she used to occupy when she intended to welcome her father's friend. Now she was to welcome a husband. Laird Cherrytrees was, as might have been expected, allowing Donald to take his liberty of the road-side, grazing while he was busy reconnoitering the cottage. The moment he saw the form of Effie standing where he had for several long days wished to see her, he pulled up Donald's bridle with the alacrity of youth, and, striking his sides with his unarmed heels, made all the speed of a bridegroom to get to his bride. The sight of the object he had gazed upon so unceasingly for so long a time, and whom he had strained his eyes in vain to see during these eventful days, operated like a charm on the old lover. He discovered at first sight the red, swollen eyes of Effie; but he was too happy in thinking he had been successful, as he had no doubt he had, to meditate on the struggle which produced his bliss. Having taken a long draught of the fountain of his hopes and happiness, and feasted his eyes on the face of the maiden, who attempted to smile through her tears, which he did sitting on his horse, and, without speaking a word—for, loquacious in politics or rural economy, he was mute in love—he dismounted, while Effie, as usual, held the reins. He lost no time in getting into his chair, falling back into it like a breathless traveller who has at last attained the end of his journey. David and Betty, who construed Effie's conduct into a consent, took an early opportunity, while she was still at the door, of letting the happy Laird know that their daughter, as they conceived, was inclined to the match. The Laird received the intelligence as if it had been too much for mortal to bear. He was at first beyond the vulgar habit of speech. He sighed, turned his eyes in their sockets, groaned, and wrung his hands. On recovering himself, he exclaimed——
"Whar is she, Betty? Let me see the dear creature. David, ye'll hae Ravelrigg; it's the best o' them a'. Whan is't to be, Betty? Ye maun fix the day; an' ye maun brak the thing to Lucy, and to Jenny Mucklewham; for I hae nae pooer. Let me see her—let me see the sweet creature this instant."
Effie, at the request of her mother, came in and resumed her seat on the three-footed stool. Her eyes were still swollen, and she looked sorrowfully at her father. The Laird fixed his eyes on her; but his loquacity was gone. He had not a word to say; but his "glowrin" was in some degree changed, being accompanied by a soft smile of self-complacency and contentment, and freed from the nervous irritability with which he used to solicit with his eyes a look from the object of his affections. His visit this day was shorter than it used to be. Next day, Betty was to visit Burnbank, to arrange for the marriage.
Meanwhile, the unfortunate girl resigned herself as a self-sacrifice into the hands of her mother. Bound with the silken bands of filial affection, she renounced all desire of exercising her own free-will, or indulging in those feelings of the female heart which are deemed so strong as to demand the sacrifice often of all other earthly considerations. The fate of Iphiginia has occupied the pens and tongues of pitying mortals for thousands of years. A lovely woman sacrificed for a fair wind, doomed to have the blood that mantled in the blushing cheeks of beauty sprinkled on the altar of a false religion, is a spectacle which the imagination cannot contemplate without a participation of the strongest sympathies of the heart; yet there are, in the common every-day world we now live in, many a scene in the act of being performed, where, though there is no bloodshed and no smoking altar exhibited, the sacrifice is not less than that of the Grecian victim. Our blessed, holy altar of matrimony is often, by the wayward feelings of man—for we here say nothing of vice or corrupt conduct—made more cruel than those of Moloch and Chiun. There is many a bloodless Iphiginia in those days, whose sufferings are unknown and unsung, because confined to the heart that broke over them and concealed them in death. The young, tender, and devoted female, who, for the love she bears to her parents, consents to intermarry with rich age, to embrace dry bones, to extend her sympathies to churlishness, caprice, and ill-nature, or, what is worse, to the asthmatic giggle of a superannuated love, while all the while her heart, cheated of its tribute and swelling with indignation, requires to be watched by her with vigilance and firmness, the cruelty of which she herself feels—presents a form of self-sacrifice possessing claims on the pity of mankind beyond those of the boasted self-immolation of ancient devotees.
The silence and dejection of our bride were construed, by her parents, into that seemly and becoming sedateness which sensible young women think it proper to assume on the eve of so important a change in their condition as marriage; while the happy bridegroom had come to that time of life when he is pleased with submission, though it be expressed through tears. No chemical menstruum has so much power in the dissolution of the hardest metals as the self-complacency of an old lover has in construing, according to his wishes, the actions, words, or looks of the young woman who is destined to be his bride. Silence and tears are expressive of happiness as well as of grief; and, so long as the desire of the ancient philosopher is uncomplied with by the gods, and there is no window to the heart, that organ in the young victim may break while the sexagenarian bridegroom is enjoying the imputed silent, restrained happiness of the object of his ill-timed affection.