Pride and its Prisoners. By A. L. O. E

Front matter

PRIDE AND HIS PRISONERS E7 A. L. O. E. Aiithorctof "The Yontig Pilgrim," "Flora," "The CUnt-klller," "Ttaellobj F-mll.,' Precepts in Practice," " Idols in tho Heart," Sic &c "Ot what bare I to .lo with Pride!'*— Sir W. Soott, LONDON: T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW; EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK. MDCCCLX. CONTENTS. Chapt-r PoRf I. The Haunted Dwelling, ... ... ... wmm 5 II. Resisted, tet returning, ... ... ... ... \q III. Snares, ... ... ... ... ... 26 IV. A Glance into the Cottage, ... ... ... ... 33 V. Both Sides, ... ... ... ... ... p#> 43 VI. The Visit to the Hall, ... ... ... ... 51 VII. A Misadventure, ... ... ... ... GO VIII. A Brother's Effort, ... ... ... ... ... 75 IX. Disappointment, ... ... ... ... ... 83 X. On the Watch, ... ... ... ... ... $e XI. The Quarrel, ... ... ... ... ... 102 Xir.

Chapter I. The Haunted Dwelling

" He who envies now thy state, Who now is plotting how he may seduee Thee also from ohedience; that with him, Bereaved of happiness; thou mavst partake His punishment, — eternal misery! " Hilton. Bright and joyous was the aspect of nature on a spring morning in the beautiful county of Somerset shire. The budding green on the trees was yet so light, that, like a transparent veil, it showed the out lines of every twig ; but on the lowlier hedges it lay like a rich mantle of foliage, and clusters of prim roses nestled below, while the air was perfumed with violets. Already was heard the hum of some adven turous bee in search of early sweets, the distant low of cattle from the pasture, the mellow note of the cuckoo from the grove, — every sight and sound told of enjoyment on that sunny Sabbath morn.

Yet let me make an exception. There was one spot which reserved to itself the unenviable privilege of looking gloomy all the year round. Nettleby Tower, a venerable edifice, stood on the highest sum mit of a hill, like some stern guardian of the fair country that smiled around it. The tower had been raised in the time of the Normans, and had then been the robber-hold of a succession of fierce barons, who, from their strong position, had defied the power of king or law. The iron age had passed away. The moat had been dried, and the useless portcullis had rusted over the gate. The loop-holes, whence archers had pointed their shafts, were half filled up with the rubbish accumulated by time. Lichens had mantled the grey stone till its original hue was almost undistinguishable ; silent and deserted was the court yard which had so often echoed to the clatter of hoofs, or the ringing clank of armour.

Silent and deserted — yes ! It was not time alone that had wrought the desolation. Nettleby Tower had stood a siege in the time of the Commonwealth, and the marks of bullets might still be traced on its walls; but the injuries which had been inflicted by the slow march of centuries, or the more rapid visita tion of war, were slight compared to those which had been wrought by litigation and family dissension. The property had been for years the subject of a vexatious lawsuit, which had half ruined the unsuccessful party, and the present owner of Nettleby Tower had not cared to take personal possession of the gloomy pile. Perhaps Mr. Auger knew that the feeling of the neighbourhood would be against him, as the sympathies of all would be enlisted on the side of the descendant of that ancient family which had for centuries dwelt in the Tower, who had been deprived of his birthright by the will of a proud and intem perate father.

The old fortress had thus been suffered to fall into decay. Grass grew in the courtyard ; the wallflower clung to the battlements ; the winter snow and the summer rain made their way through the broken casements, and no hand had removed the mass of wreck which lay where a furious storm had thrown down one of the ancient chimneys. Parties of tourists occasionally visited the gloomy place, trod the long, dreary corridors, and heard from a wrinkled woman accounts of the moth-eaten tapestry, and the time darkened family portraits that grimly frowned from the walls. They heard tales of the last Mr. Bardon, the proud owner of the pile ; how he had been wont to sit long and late over his bottle, carousing with jovial companions, till the hall resounded with their oaths and their songs; and how, more than thirty years back, he had disinherited his only son for marrying a farmer's daughter.

Then the old woman would, after slowly showing the way up the worn stone steps which led round and round till they opened on the summit of the tower, direct her listener's attention to a small grey speck in the wide spreading landscape below, and tell them that Dr. Bardon lived there in needy circumstances, in actual sight of the place where, if every man had his right, lie would now be dwelling as his fathers had dwelt. And the visitors would sigh, shake their heads, and moralize on the strange changes in human fortunes. The old woman who showed strangers over Nettleby Tower lived in a cottage hard by; neither she nor any other person was ever to be found in the old halls after the sun had set. The place had the repute of being haunted, and was left after dark to the sole possession of the rooks, the owls, and the bats.

I must tax the faith of my readers to believe that the old tower was actually haunted ; not by the ghosts of the dead, but by the spirits of evil that are ever moving amongst the living. I must at tempt with a bold hand to draw aside the mysterious veil which divides the invisible from the visible world, and though I must invoke imagination to my aid, it is imagination fluttering on the confines of truth. Bear with me, then, while I personify the spirits of Pride and Intemperance, and represent them as lingering yet in the pile in which for centuries they had borne sway over human hearts. Standing on the battlements of the grey tower, behold two dim, but gigantic forms, like dark clouds, that to the eye of fancy have assumed a mortal shape. The little rock-plant that has found a cradle between the crumbling stones bends not beneath their weight, — and yet how many deep rooted hopes have they crushed !

Their unsubstan tial shapes cast no shadow on the wall, and yet have darkened myriads of homes! The natural sense cannot recognise their presence ; the eye beholds them not, the human ear cannot catch the low thunder of their speech; and yet there they stand, terrible realities, — known, like the invisible plague, by their effects upon those whom they destroy ! There is a wild light in the eyes of Intemperance, not caught from the glad sunbeams that are bathing the world in glory; it is like a red meteor playing over some deep morass, and though there is often mirth in his tone, it is such mirth as jars upon the shuddering soul like the laugh of a raving maniac! Pride is of more lofty stature than his companion, perhaps of yet darker hue, and his voice is lower and deeper. His features are stamped with the impress of all that piety abhors and conscience shrinks from, for we behold him without his veil.

Human in firmity may devise soft names for cherished sins, and even invest them with a specious glory which de ceives the dazzled eye; but who could endure to see in all their bare deformity those two arch soul-de stroyers, Intemperance and Pride ? " Nay, it was I who wrought this ruin!" exclaimed the former, stretching his shadowy hand over the desolated dwelling. "Think you that had Hugh Bardon possessed his senses unclouded by my spell, he would ever have driven forth from his home his own — his only son?" " "Was it not I," replied Pride, " who ever stood beside him, counting up the long line of his ancestry, inflaming his soul with legends of the past, making him look upon his own blood as something different from that which flows in the veins of ordinary mortals, till he learned to regard a union with one of lower rank as a crime beyond forgiveness?"

" I," cried Intemperance, "intoxicated his brain" — " I," interrupted Pride, " intoxicated his spirit. You fill your deep cup with fermented beverage ; the fermentation which I cause is within the soul, and it varies according to the different natures that re ceive it. There is the vinous fermentation, that Avhich man calls high spirit, and the world hails with applause, whether it sparkle up into courage, or effervesce into hasty resentment. There is the acid fermentation; the sourness of a spirit brooding over wrongs and disappointments, irritated against its fellow-man, and regarding his acts with suspicion. This the world views with a kind of compassionate scorn, or perhaps tolerates as something that may occasionally correct the insipidity of social inter course. And there is the third, the last stage of fermentation, when hating and hated of all, wrapt up in his own self-worship, and poisoning the atmosphere around with the exhalations of rebellion and unbelief, my slave becomes, even to his fellow-bondsmen, an object of aversion and disgust.

Such was my power over the spirit of Hugh Bardon. I quenched the parent's yearning over his son; I kept watch even by his bed of death ; and when holy words of warn ing were spoken, I made him turn a deaf ear to the charmer, and hardened his soul to destruction!" " I yield this point to you," said Intemperance, " I grant that your black badge was rivetted on the miserable Bardon even more firmly than mine. And yet, what are your scattered conquests to those which I hourly achieve! Do I not drive my thousands and tens of thousands down the steep descent of folly, misery, disgrace, till they perish in the gulf of ruin ? Count the gin-palaces dedicated to me in this pro fessedly Christian land; are they not crowded with my victims? Who can boast a power to injure that is to be compared to mine ?

" " Your power is great," replied Pride, " but it is a power that has limits, nay, limits that become nar rower and narrower as civilization and religion gain ground. You have been driven from many a stately abode, where once Intemperance was a welcome guest, and have to cower amongst the lowest of the low, and seek your slaves amongst the vilest of the vile. Seest thou yon church," continued Pride, pointing to the spire of a small, but beautiful edifice, embowered amongst elms and beeches ; " hast thou ever dared so much as to touch one clod of the turf on which falls the shadow of that building?" " It is, as you w ell know, forbidden ground," replied Intemperance. "To you— to you, but not to me!" exclaimed Pride, his form dilating with exultation. " I enter it unseen with the worshippers, my voice blends with the hymn of praise; nay, I sometimes mount the pulpit with the preacher,* and while a rapt audience hang upon his words, infuse my secret poison into his soul!

When offerings are collected for the poor, how much of the silver and the gold is tarnished and tainted by my breath ! The very monuments raised to the dead often bear the print of my touch ; I fix the escutcheon, write the false epitaph, and hang my banner boldly even over the Christian's tomb ! " " Your power also has limits," quoth Intemper ance. " There is an antidote in the inspired Book for every poison that you can instil." " I know it, I know it," exclaimed Pride, " and marks it not the extent of my influence and the depth of the deceptions that I practise, that against no spirit, except that of Idolatry, are so many warn ings given in that Book as against the spirit of Pride? For every denunciation against Intemperance, how * " What a beautiful sermon you gave us to-day ! " exclaimed a lady to her pastor.

"The devil told me the very same thing while I was in the pulpit," was his quaint, but comprehensive reply. many may be found against me! Not only religion and morality are your mortal opponents, but self interest and self-respect unite to weaken the might of Intemperance ; I have but one foe that I fear, one that singles me out for conflict! As David with his sling to Goliath, so to Pride is the Spirit of the Gospel!" " How is it, then," inquired Intemperance, " that so many believers in the Gospel fall under your sway?" " It is because I have so many arts, such subtle devices, I can change myself into so many different shapes; I steal in so softly that I waken not the sentinel Conscience to give an alarm to the soul ! You throw one broad net into the sea where you see a shoal within your reach ; I angle for my prey with skill, hiding my hook with the bait most suited to the taste of each of my victims.

You pursue your quarry openly before man ; I dig the deep hidden pit-fall for mine. You disgust even those whom you en slave ; I assume forms that rather please than offend. Sometimes I am ' a pardonable weakness,' sometimes 'a natural instinct,' sometimes," and here Pride curled his lip with a mocking smile, " I am welcomed as 'a generous virtue !'" " It is in this shape," said Intemperance angrily, " that you have sometimes even taken a part against me ! You have taught my slaves to despise and break from my yoke !" "Pass over that," replied Pride; " or balance against it the many times when I have done you a service, encouraging men to be mighty to mingle strong drink." " Nay, you must acknowledge," said Intemperance, " that we now seldom work together." " We have different spheres," answered Pride.

"You keep multitudes from ever even attempting to enter the fold ; I put my manacles upon tens of thousands who deem that they already have entered. I doubt whether there be one goodly dwelling amongst all those that dot yonder wide prospect, where one, if not all of the inmates, wears not my invisible band round the arm." " You will except the pastor's, at least," said In temperance. "Yonder, on the path that leads to the school, I see his gentle daughter. She has warned many against me ; and with her words, her persuasions, her prayers, has driven me from more than one home. I shrink from the glance of that soft, dark eye, as if it carried the power of Ithuriel's spear. Ida seems to me to be purity itself; upon her, at least, you can have no hold." " Were we nearer," laughed the malignant spirit, " you would see my dark badge on the saint !

Since her childhood I have been striving and struggling to make Ida Aumerle my own. Sometimes she has snapped my chain, and I am ofttimes in fear that she will break away from my bondage for ever. But methinks I have a firm hold over her now." " Her pride must be spiritual pride," observed Intemperance. " Not so," replied his evil companion ; " I tried that spell, but my efforts failed. While with sweet voice and winning persuasion Ida is now guiding her class to Truth, and warning her little flock against us both, would you wish to hearken to the story of the maiden, and hear all that I have done to win entrance into a heart which the grace of God has cleansed?" " Tell me her history," said Intemperance ; " she seems to me like the snowdrop that lifts its head above the sod, pure as a flake from the skies." "Even the snowdrop has its roots in the earth," was the sardonic answer of Pride.

Chapter II. Resisted, Yet Returning

" Mount up, for heaven is won by prayer; Be sober— for thou art not there ! " Kkble. " The sacred pages of God's own book Shall bo the spring, the eternal brook, In whose holy mirror, night and day, Thou'lt study heaven's reflected ray. And should the foes of virtue dare "With gloomy wing to seek thee there, Thou will see how dark their shadows lie. Between heaven and thee, and trembling fly. Moork. " Ida Aumerle," began the dark narrator, " at the age of twelve had the misfortune to lose her mother, __> and was left, with a sister several years younger than herself, to the sole care of a tender and indulgent father. Ever on the watch to strengthen my inte rests amongst the children of men, I sounded the dispositions of the sisters, to know what chance I possessed of making them prisoners of Pride.

Mabel, clever, impulsive, fearless in character, with a mind ready to receive every impression, and a spirit full of energy and emulation, I knew to be one who was likely readily to come under the power of my spell. Ida was less easily won ; she was a more thoughtful, contemplative girl, her temper was less quick, her RESISTED, YET EETUENING. 17 passions were less easily roused, and I long doubted where lay the weak point of character on which Pride might successfully work. "As Ida grew towards womanhood my doubts were gradually dispelled. I marked that the fair maiden loved to linger opposite the mirror which reflected her tall, slight, graceful form, and that the gazelle eyes rested upon it with secret satisfaction. There was much time given to braiding the hair and adorning the person ; and the fashion of a dress, the tint of a ribbon, became a subject for grave considera tion.

There are thousands of girls enslaved by the pride of beauty with far less cause than Ida Aumerle." " But this folly," observed Intemperance, " was likely to give j^ou but temporary power. Beauty is merely skin-deep, and passes away like a flower ! " "But often leaves the pride of it behind," replied his companion. " There is many a wrinkled woman who can never forget that she once was fair, — nay, who seems fondly to imagine that she can never cease to be fair ; and who makes herself the laugh ing-stock of the world by assuming in age the attire and graces of youth. It will never be thus with Ida Aumerle. " I thought that my chain was firmly fixed upon her, when one evening I found it suddenly torn from her wrist, and trampled beneath her feet ! The household at the Vicarage had retired to rest ; Ida had received her father's nightly blessing, and was sitting alone in her own little room.

The lamplight fell upon a form and face that might have been thought to excuse some pride, but Ida's reflections at that moment had nothing in common with me. She was bending eagerly over that Book which con demns, and would destroy me, — a book which she had ofttimes perused before, but never with the earnest devotion which was then swelling her heart. Her hands were clasped, her dark eyes swimming in joyful tears, and her lips sometimes moved in prayer, — not cold, formal prayer, such as I myself might prompt, but the outpouring of a spirit over flowing with grateful love. That was the birthday of a soul ! I stood gloomily apart ; I dared not approach one first conscious of her immortal destiny, first communing in spirit with her God !" "You gave up your designs, then, in despair?" " You would have done so," answered Pride with haughtiness ; "I do not despair, I only delay.

I found that pride of beauty had indeed given way to a nobler, more exalting feeling. Ida had drunk at the fountain of purity, and the petty rill of personal vanity had become to her insipid and distasteful. She was putting away the childish things which amuse the frivolous soul. Ida's time was now too well filled up with a succession of pious and chari table occupations, to leave a superfluous share to the toilette. The maiden's dress became simple, because the luxury which she now esteemed was that of assisting the needy, Many of her trinkets were laid aside, not because she deemed it a sin to wear them, but because her mind was engrossed by higher things. One whose first object and desire is to please a heavenly Master by performing angels' offices below, is hardly likely to dwell much on the con sideration that her face and her figure are comely."

" Ida is, I know, reckoned a model of every feminine virtue," said Intemperance. " I can con ceive that your grand design was now to make her think herself as perfect as all the rest of the world thought her." " Ay, ay ; to involve her in spiritual pride ! But the maiden was too much on her knees, examined her own heart too closely, tried herself by too lofty a standard for that. When the faintest shadow of that temptation fell upon her, she started as though she had seen the viper lurking under the flowers, and cast it from her with abhorrence ! ' A sinner, a weak, helpless sinner, saved only by the mercy, trusting only in the strength of a higher power ;' this Ida Aumerle not only calls herself, but actually feels herself to be. The power of Grace in her heart is too strong on that point for Pride."

" And yet you hope to subject her to your sway ?" " About two years after the night which I have mentioned," resumed Pride, "after Ida had attained the age of eighteen, she resided for some time at Aspendale, the home of her uncle, Augustine Au merle." "One of your prisoners?" inquired Intemperance. " Of him anon," replied the dark one, " our present subject is his niece. At his dwelling Ida met with one who had been Augustine's college companion, Eeginald, Earl of Dashleigh. You can just discern the towers of his mansion faint in the blue distance yonder." " I know it," replied Intemperance ; " I fre quented the place in his grandfather's time. The present earl, as I understand, is your votary rather than mine." " Puffed up with pride of rank," said the stern spirit; "but pride of rank could not withstand a stronger passion, or prevent him from laying his for tune and title at the feet of Ida Aumerle."

" An opportunity for you!" suggested Intemperance. "A golden opportunity I deemed it. What woman is not dazzled by a coronet? what girl is in sensible to the flattering attentions of him who owns one, even if he possess no other recommendation, which, with Dashleigh, is far from being the case? There was a struggle in the mind of Ida. I whispered to her of all those gilded baubles for which numbers have eagerly bartered happiness here, and' forfeited happiness hereafter. I set before her grand images of earthly greatness, the pomp and trappings of state, the homage paid by the world to station. I strove to inflame her mind with ambition. But here Ida sought counsel of the Allwise, and she saw through my glittering snare. The earl, though of character unblemished in the eyes of man, and far from indifferent to religion, is not one whom a heaven bound pilgrim like Ida would choose as a companion for life.

Dashleigh's spirit is too much clogged with earth; he is too much divided in his service; he wears too openly my chain, as if he deemed it an ornament or distinction. Ida prayed, reflected, and then resolved. She declined the addresses of her uncle's guest, and returned home at once to her father." " The wound which she inflicted was not a deep one," remarked Intemperance. " Dashleigh was speedily consoled, without even seeking comfort from _ j me. " I poisoned his wound," exclaimed Pride, " and drove him to seek instant cure. Dashleigh's rejec tion aroused in his breast as much indignation as grief; and I made the disappointed and irritated man at once offer his hand to one who was not likely to decline it, Annabella, the young cousin of Ida." " And what said the high-souled Ida to the sud den change in the object of his devotion?"

" I breathed in her ear," answered Pride, " the suggestion, ' He might have wTaited a little longer.' I called up a flush to the maiden's cheek when she received tidings of the hasty engagement. But still I met with little but repulse. With maidenly re serve Ida concealed even from her own family a se cret which pride might have led her to reveal, and none more affectionately congratulated the young countess on her engagement, than she who might have worn the honours which now devolved upon another." " Ida Aumerle appears to be gifted with such a power of resisting your influence and repelling your temptations, that I can scarcely imagine," quoth In temperance, " upon what you can ground your as surance that you hold her captive at length. Pride of beauty, pride of conquest, pride of ambition, she has subdued; to spiritual pride she never has yielded.

What dart remains in your quiver when so many have swerved from the mark?" " Or rather, have fallen blunted from the shield of faith," gloomily interrupted Pride. " Ida's real dan ger began when she thought the dart too feeble to render it needful to lift the shield against it. Ida, on her return home, found her father on the point of contracting a second marriage with a lady who had been one of his principal assistants in ar ranging and keeping in order the machinery of his parish. Miss Lambert, by her activity and energy, seemed a most fitting help-meet for a pastor. She was Aumerle's equal in fortune and birth, and not many years his junior in age. She had been always on good terms with his family, and the connection appeared one of the most suitable that under the circumstances could have been formed.

And so it might have proved," continued Pride, " but for me!" " Is Mrs. Aumerle, then, under your control?" " She is somewhat proud of her good management, of her clear common sense, of her knowledge of the world," was the dark one's reply; "and this is one cause of the coldness between her and the daughters of her husband. Ida, from childhood, had been accustomed to govern her own actions and direct her own pursuits. Steady and persevering in character, she had not only pursued a course of education by herself, but had superintended that of her more impetuous sister. Since her mother's death Ida had been subject to no sensible control, for her father looked upon her as perfection, and left her a degree of freedom which to most girls might have been highly dangerous. Thus her spirit had become more independent, and her opinions more formed than is usual in those of her age.

On her father's marriage Ida found herself dethroned from the position which she so long had held. She was second where she had been first, — second in the house, second in the parish, second in the affections of a parent whom she almost idolatrously loved. I saw that the moment had come for inflicting a pang; you will believe that the opportunity was not trifled away! Ida had been accustomed to lead rather than to follow. She exercised almost boundless in fluence over her sister Mabel, and was regarded as an oracle by the poor. Another was now taking her place, and another whose views on many subjects materially differed from her own, who saw various duties in a different light, and whose character dis posed her to act in petty matters the part of a zealous reformer. I marked Ida's annoyance at changes proposed, improvements resolved on, and I silently pushed my advantage.

I have now placed Ida in the position of an independent state, armed to resist encroachments from, and owning no allegiance to a powerful neighbour. There is indeed no open war; decency, piety, and regard for the feelings of a husband and father alike forbid all approach to that; but there is secret, ceaseless, determined opposition. I never suffer Ida to forget that her own tastes are more refined, her ideas more elevated than those of her step-mother; and I will not let her perceive that in many of the affairs of domestic life, Mrs. Aumerle, as she had wider experience, has also clearer judg ment than herself. I represent advice from a stepmother as interference, reproof from a step-mother as persecution, and draw Ida to seek a sphere of her own as distinct as possible from that of the woman whom her father has chosen for his wife."

" Doubtless you occasionally remind the fair maid," suggested Intemperance, " that but for her own heroic unworldliness she might have been a peeress of the realm." " I neglect nothing," answered Pride, " that can serve to elevate the spirit of one whom I seek to enslave. I have need of caution and reserve, though hitherto I have met with success, for it is no easy task thoroughly to blind a conscience once enlightened like that of Ida. She does even now in hours of self-examination reproach herself for a feeling to wards Mrs. Aumerle which almost approaches dislike. She feels that her own peace is disturbed; for the lightest breath of sin can cloud the bright mirror of such a soul. But in such hours I hover near. I draw the penitent's attention from her own faults to those of the woman she loves not, till I make her pity herself where she should blame, and account the burden which _" have laid upon her as a cross ap pointed by Heaven."