Wednesday.—Well, here we are! raining all night, and when I could sleep, haunted by dire mischances, torrents, slides, etc. Waked by a devilish gong! Hot biscuits, potatoes, and corn-bread, on the breakfast-table; could eat none of them. Villainous tea! Raining and sunshining alternately, so that no mortal can tell whether to go or stay; and meantime here am I, sitting by a gloomy window where I can see nothing but these useless mountains. Lord, forgive me! The angels do hover about me, even here, in the shape of my children! Etc., etc., etc.!
The cloudy evening has closed in upon us early. It has been long, but not tedious. We began it with reading aloud The Heir of Redcliffe. It is one of those novels of the day that seem to me to preach, as few preachers do, the true Gospel doctrine. It is so cleverly, so charmingly written, that one is persuaded of the Christian truths of forgiveness and self-sacrifice, vitalized in the lives of Guy and Amy, without one thought or argument bristling up against them, as they sometimes do against the ordained preacher. I will try to imitate Amy in her cheerful submission to a disappointment far heavier than mine—for the husband must be dearer than the lover.
You think me cool, dear friend; I am only trying to be so, and how far I shall succeed I doubt, as a cold shivering runs through my veins as I hear the winds and think of Carl on the ocean.
I laid down my pen. I perceive my father watches me very narrowly. 'My child,' he said, 'you are shaking with cold,' (not with 'cold,' I could have answered;) 'these confounded stoves,' he added, 'keep one in an alternate ague and fever; come, waltz round the room with your sister, and get into a glow.' So, singing our own music, we waltzed till we were out of breath; and Alice has seated herself at picquet with my father, who has a run of luck, 'point! seizieme! and capote!' which puts him into high good humor—and I may write unmarked, and let my thoughts, unbridled, fly off after Carl. He was to write me once more before his embarkation, but I can not get the letter till we return, and I have not the poor consolation of looking over the list of the steamer's passengers and seeing the strange names of those who would seem to me happy enough to be in the same ship with him—and yet, what care they for that! Poor fellow! he will be but sorry company, I know. I find support in the faith that I am doing my duty. He could not see it in that light, and had neither comfort for himself nor sympathy for me. I almost wish now, when I think of him in his desolation, that I could receive the worldly philosophy my old nurse offered me when, as Carl drove away, she came into my room and found me crying bitterly. She hushed me tenderly as she was used to do when I was a child; and when I said, 'Hannah, it is for him, not for myself, I feel'—'Oh! that's nothing but a nonsense, child,' she said, 'men an't that way; they go about among folks and get rid of feelings; it's women that stay at home and keep 'em alive, brooding on 'em!' Will he soon 'get rid' of them?
Why should I thus shrink from a consequence I ought to desire? and yet, in my secret soul, I do shrink from it. But perhaps it will be easier as I go on, if it be true that
'Each goodly thing is hardest to begin;
But entered in a spacious court, they see
Both plain, and pleasant to be walked in.'
Wednesday Morning.—My father happened to cast his eye across the table as I finished my last page, and he saw a tear fall on it. Throwing down his cards he said, 'Come, come, children, it's time to go to bed;' and stooping over me, he kissed me fondly, and murmured: 'Dear, good child, I can not stand it if I see you unhappy.' He shall not see me so; I have risen to-day with this resolution.
The rain has been pouring down all night, but at this glorious point of sight, directly under Mount Washington, we are 'equal to either fate,' going on or staying.
Mr. Thompson has again surprised us with a delicious breakfast of tender chickens, light biscuit, excellent bread, fresh eggs, and that rarest of comforts at a hotel, delicious coffee, with a brimming pitcher of cream. We wondered at all these domestic comforts, for we have not heard the flutter of a petticoat in the house till we saw our respectable landlady in spectacles gliding out of the room. We learned from her that she was the only womankind on the 'diggings.' Every thing is neatly done, so we bless our October star for exempting us from the tardy and careless service of chambermaids. While it rains, we walk on the piazza, enjoying the beautiful and ever-varying effects of the clouds as they roll down the mountains, and roll off—like the shadows on our human life, dear Susan, that God's love does often lift from it.
The Glen-House is on the lowest ridge of the hill that rises opposite to Mount Washington, which, as its name indicates, stands head and shoulders above the other summits, having no peer. Madison and Monroe come next, on the left, and then Jefferson, who appears (characteristically?) higher than he is. In a line with Mount Washington, on the other side, are Adams, Clay, etc. These names (excepting always Washington) do not, with their recent political associations, seem quite to suit these sublime, eternal mounts, but as time rolls on, the names will grow to signs of greatness, and harmonize with physical stability and grandeur. Jefferson's head seems quite consistently modeled after an European pattern. It runs up to a sharp point, and wants but accumulated masses of ice to be broken into Alpine angles. My father says there are other passes in the mountains more beautiful than this—none can be grander.