Hope E——! What a scourge wert thou to every bashful youngster! There was a laughing deviltry in thy eye, which threw mine into a sudden gaze upon vacuity, or inspired an irresistible desire to examine my feet—while a deepening flush of the cheeks proclaimed the intensity of my curiosity! Never were there eyes more keen in detecting the occasional spots which diversify the face of boyhood—in discovering whose hands water would not sully—whose locks the fingers of the friseur might improve. Her laugh was the terror of every bashful youth—it was the signal of his discomfiture—it rang in his ears when alone—it haunted his fancy—it mingled with his dreams. Hope E——, thou torment of my early years! No artifice could hide from thy searching gaze any blemish of person or dress, which my pride or modesty was desirous of concealing. If my face was soiled—if there was a puncture in the elbow of my coat, thy laugh would first announce it. Any unfortunate rent in my nether integuments, was sure of detection, although every possible means was used to conceal it, and that laugh—that wild, gleeful laugh, would summon the eager gaze of all to thine embarrassed victim! My highest audacity could never encounter her eyes; they alone were enough to drive mad a modest youth. And yet I could not avoid them, for in spite of myself, mine were constantly straying in that direction, drawn thitherward by an impulse beyond the control of my will—the nature of which my philosophy has never yet unravelled. Believe me, that in all my visits to her brother, I avoided her with a dexterity, worthy the skill of the most finished adept in the fashionable art of “cutting acquaintance.” But it was vain to struggle against destiny. Poor C——! my bosom’s earliest friend—his mother’s hope—died—suddenly died in the first bloom of youth! How thrilled my young heart, as I knelt by his bedside, and caught from his dying lips a whispered farewell! He died—but, can death destroy a mother’s love? To me was transferred a portion of that deep, gushing affection, which had been thus suddenly driven back upon its source. A week elapsed—and I was summoned to an interview with Mrs. E——. What an invitation for a bashful youth! My heart forboded approaching calamity—it blenched like a wounded man—it already felt the glance of Hope—it trembled at the anticipation of her laugh. But there could be no demur—there was no escape—I must go. View me there, “creeping like snail unwillingly,” over the small grass plot which separated our dwellings—kicking every stone and mushroom upon my path—“screwing up” my courage to an effort the most desperate, it had ever yet been called upon to sustain. I finally succeeded—gained the door—hesitated—my resolution failed—it rallied, and I entered the parlor with all the grace of attitude and mien, which may be observed in a detected sheep-stealer. Hope and her mother were there. I had scarcely made this observation, when I was enfolded in an embrace, nerved by all the fearful energies of a mother’s love! In a paroxysm of mingled grief and affection, she covered my face with the kisses and tears of an overflowing heart. But forget not me. What a predicament! Reader, art thou a bashful man? I ask your sympathy, I claim your advice. What would you have done? What could I do, but stand, perspiring with the intensity of my embarrassment—desperately clenching, with both hands, my hat—bracing my nerves to endurance—my eyes downcast with shame—my face burning with blushes—modesty personified! When this first outbreaking of maternal love had subsided, I stood in trembling expectation of its renewal. I durst not look up, for the eyes of Hope, swimming with suppressed mirth, at my ludicrous appearance, tortured even my fancy. A long struggle gave me the requisite courage to cast, from the corner of my eye, a timid glance towards her. I ventured to hope that the worst was over. Alas! how delusive! woes come not single. My eye no sooner met hers, than she—moved by sympathy, or one of the thousand impulses of passion or caprice which govern the actions of the fair, or something else, (I am no philosopher,)—rushed towards me, threw her arms convulsively around my neck, and with kisses and tears did admirable honor to the maternal example! Could a bashful youth endure this—be clasped in the arms of her he feared, yet loved—could he experience this, and survive the shock? I rushed in agony from the room, nor slackened my career, until I had buried my head in the recesses of my own solitary chamber.
Poor Hope! poor Hope! she died within a year.
“O! sic semper! sic semper vidi, amatas spes abire.”
Years have rolled away, and the marks of manhood now darken his cheek, which once kindled under the glance of Hope E——. But the lapse of time has not—can not—change the peculiarities of his mind; he lived constantly in Droneville—he never mingled with society, and that youthful diffidence which maturer years wears off from the minds of others, was in his deepened into an exquisite sensitiveness, which draws from the slightest ridicule or neglect materials for self-torture. The sarcasm which glides from the ears of the giddy—the glance of indifference or scorn, unfelt by the votary of fashion, gains a lodgment in his breast, and for weeks, yes, months, preys upon its peace. He hears the laugh of the incredulous, the sneer of the cynic, the aphorism of the moralist, but neither, nor all, can drive from its lair this demon within him,—it is inwrought with the very texture of his soul—it is a part of its undying essence.
Ye who can feel for others’ woes, imagine the sufferings of a mind thus strung, yet branded with all the rusticity of Droneville manners, exposed to the taunts and ridicule of College life. View him, the butt of sarcasm—the mark of scorn—the bound, the unarmed victim, against whose breast all aspirant wits may with impunity test the point of every weapon, and their own dexterity in its use. My Droneville education! It has been a “heritage of woe”—a source of the deepest, acutest suffering. In manners, in appearance, in every thing which the cant of society calls “elegance,” I was not only entirely deficient, but so absolutely clownish as to elicit wit from stupidity itself. Follow such an one, forced by circumstances beyond his control into the cold world of fashion, and your fancy can picture those scenes of embarrassment and humiliation, which my memory shrinks from recalling. And yet, my mind—my mind was of no such ungainly mould. If this clay was thrown amidst the stock of Droneville, it had been fired by an intellect whose boundless aspirations scorned all limit or control. What if it did know nought of the refinements of artificial life? From the mountain solitude—from the heavens above—from the earth, in its sublimity—from the whisperings of its own spirit, it had drawn in all that is deep in emotion or thrilling in thought. If it was a stranger to society, it was no stranger to the greatest minds of the present and past ages. It requires not the formalities of fashion—none of the coxcomb’s art—to hold communion with this ethereal principle within us—to dwell with the genius of the mighty Past—to soar amidst the high hopes of the Future—to love and worship those beings with whom imagination peoples her own brilliant creations. Must I be a scorned outcast, neglected by my race, because this perishable clay was not moulded in that form, which might please the evanescent fancy? because my limbs would not play the buffoon at the beck of fashion, or my tongue utter, or my spirit endure, her language of emptiness and deceit? A misanthrope? no! I scorn that name, but scorn more him who covets the reputation or affects the spirit of misanthropy. A misanthrope! never. The source of my suffering was a consciousness of a deep fountain of feeling—of love, (if you please,) without one being upon whom I could lavish it; for who would deign to accept the devotion of a clown?—it was too much to ask of any one’s benevolence. Can there be one more unfortunate? Is there suffering more intense, than that of a being conscious of mental power, infinitely superior to the butterflies of fashion—glowing with all that is rich in thought, or deathless in love—a love, which, squandering on its object entire devotion, stoops to no barter of affection but soul for soul—yet, having all its energies paralyzed by a sense of awkwardness—a serpent whose folds are drawn tauter by his very struggles to resist them. Place such a mind, keenly sensitive to ridicule or neglect, in the gay saloon; with all his intellect he feels himself a mark for the sarcasm of the most insignificant. He can neither move, nor speak, and while his heart is overflowing with emotion, he is scorned as an unfeeling brute! No one cares for him—no one knows his sorrows—no eye
“will mark
His coming, and look brighter when he comes.”
The joyful faces around him—the gay laugh ringing in his ears—the warm kiss of affection—the soft whisper of love—all, all reveal the solitude, the hopelessness of his lot. How often have I been thus placed! How often, as I have stood, hour after hour, silent and alone, amidst a crowd of my species, have I thought, that a whole life’s love would not recompense one glance of remembrance—one word of welcome! All this too, while I have seen the selfish caressed—the ignorant flattered, and quailed beneath the eye of those, whom, if met upon the arena of mind, I could have crushed. But I have suffered most deeply, most keenly, from those in whose gratitude, at least, I had reposed some confidence. If there be one crime—one of guilt so unmitigated as to wake the thunderbolt, as to call down retributive justice—it is that viper, ingratitude. No exertion of human power can suppress it, laws cannot define it, penalties cannot reach it;—the law of love, that last hope of virtue, is powerless here. And yet, it is a crime which would drive all joy from earth—it would crush all that is holy in the heart—it would dissever man from his species.
As the eye of one after another has lighted upon me, and turned scornfully from the uncouth clown before them, I have prayed—yes, prayed—it could not be impious—that their vision might for one instant be quickened, so as to penetrate the mind. It is too much to hope for here,—but