The Heir of Maberley. A novel

Section I

" Can man be sair, that withers at a blast ? Or he be strong, that airy breath can cast Can he be wise, that knows not how to live ? Or he be rich, that nothing hath to give ? Can he be young that's feeble, weak, and wan ? So fair, strong, wise, so rich, so young is man. So fair is man, that death (a parting blast) Blasts his fair flower, and makes him earth at last ; So strong is man, that with a gasping breath He totters, and bequeathes his strength to death ; So wise is man, that if with death he strive, His wisdom cannot teach him how to live ; So rich is man, that (all his debts being paid) His wealth's the winding-sheet wherein he's laid ; So young is man, that, broke with care and sorrow, He's old enough to-day, to die to-morrow : Why bragg'st thou then, thou worm of five feet long ?

Thou'rt neither fair, nor strong, nor wise, nor rich, nor young." The good reader will bear in mind that several years are to be considered as having elapsed since he had last any knowledge of the characters of this tale. In the course of that interval, changes had neces- VOL. II. sarily taken place. The consequences of great events are not all at once understood, and we are hardly yet aware of the extent to which those changes have gone. So large a portion of human life never passes without them. We have now to nar rate those which have marked the progress and are incidental to that period. It was towards the even ing of a delightful day in early spring that a friend had occasion to pass through a magnificent spot in the county of Gloucester, and his mission having led him to the large and ancient manor-house there, he quickly entered the interior of the mansion.

On a couch in a lofty and spacious room, lay the form of a beautiful but sickly boy. He was of very tender age, but the bright and intelligent glance of his eyes seemed to indicate an intellectual precocity which belonged to a much more advanced period. His hair was of a beautifully rich auburn colour ; his eyes were brilhant, but still softened by a gentle expression ; his complexion was exceedingly fair and pale, excepting where a fatal hectic tinge presented its treacherous bloom. He was reading his little book, apparently with interest, but was compelled frequently, from the interruption of a painful cough, to withdraw the book from his eyes. " I think you had better lay aside that book, my dear child," proceeded from a figure which sat near the head of the couch, and was so situated as to command without being seen the profile of a youthful invalid.

"I fear you read too much and fatigue yourself." " I will close the book if you wish it, papa," rephed the boy, meekly smiling, " but reading amuses me; and when I become a man, all my knowledge will be wanted, if, as you have said, I wish to be respected." The father sighed, feeling that while the hope which flatters the victim of the insidious disease of which his dear child was dying, was never to be reahzed, it would be cruel to damp it. He remained silent, but his countenance and manner showed the depth of his wounded and oppressed feelings. He was apparently near thirty : his face was strongly marked, and indicated that much of his expressior. was owing rather to the effect of powerful and long cherished passions, than to its original formation. The look was stern, but the muscles were tremulous, rather with agitation than tenderness, and the voice, which was now low and desponding, had that quality in its tone which indicates both strength and flexibility.

" Do as you please, my dear, do as you please," he at length said. " If you are amused, it is well ; but remember that you are not yet very strong." He said no more, but with a quiet and cautious tread left the apartment, and entered the grounds attached to the noble mansion. Passing through the inelosed gardens, he gained the park, and pro ceeded to a long and shaded avenue of large forest trees, which was his frequent resort. " My lot," he said, as he pursued his way, " is far from a happy one; and yet how could it be otherwise ? I have not desired or sought happiness, as others have done. My ambition has been of that order which cannot co-exist with tranquillity. I have dared, schemed, temporized, and have hitherto been successful. As long as I had only to contend with obstacles which roused my passions and taxed my ingenuity, I triumphed; but never suspected that I was amenable to the feelings which now unnerve and oppress me. !

I had resolved in my plan of action to reject all the seducing ten dernesses which wind about the heart : to have, in my dealings with humanity, no ' pitying ruth' ; to act upon the affections of others, but to have none of my own. . But here I am the powerless devotee of one idol of feeling. I am a widower — that be reavement I endured calmly ; I am now a father — and soon to be childless. For what have I toiled, risked, dissimulated, sinned ? If I at last, as the fruit of my policy, possess all I have aimed at, my possession will be desolate and solitary. My child gone" — here a violent convulsion shook his frame — " I live alone, and when I die — truly I have laboured in vain." Thus spoke Henry Jones. After the departure of Philip Jones, Henry be came gloomy and reserved, excepting when in the presence of the colonel, and other members of the family, he deemed it necessary to assume a more easy and cheerful air.

He was much alone, and a close observer might see that he was far from being at rest. His relations with Cheathum con tinued ; but their intercourse was less frequent, and arose more from a necessity of position than from inchnation. Crowdy had disappeared, and no one knew whither he had gone : Black Joe and his crew had thought it prudent to avoid Haresfield, and to take a different course ; while King pursued his old habits, but seemed to avoid any near contact with Cheathum. At the end of a short time after the events recorded in the last chapter, Henry Jones sought and obtained the hand of a young heiress in the county, and established his residence at the Manor House, in which her family had resided for many generations. She was an orphan, brought up under the care of a near relation, and was of a gentle spirit and amiable manners.

She had few personal charms, but her fine property brought her many suitors ; and Henry Jones, by his insinuating ad dress, added to his large expectations, succeeded against all other competitors. There was only one drawback, which was that the property of the lady would revert to the male heir-at-law in the event of her dying without issue. This objection, however, was overcome, and in due time the marriage was celebrated. It was not, scarcely could be, a happy union. Mrs. Henry Jones was meek, submissive, and tender-spirited, while her husband was cold, sarcastic, and not unfrequently morose and tyranni cal. He affected towards her, at least in the presence of others, extreme punctiliousness, but it was evident that his heart had little share in his elabo rate courtesies ; and none more deeply and bitterly felt this than his wife.

Her first child died soon after its birth ; and Henry Jones began to entertain fears that she would never produce and rear an heir to his fortunes, when a second child, a son, was born. This circumstance appeared to produce some change in his deportment ; he was more kind, and seemed occasionally to smile with an expression of more natural pleasure than formerly. Still he was a cold and a proud man, and it was not until the child had attained his third year that he seemed to feel much interested. Then, however, a change came over the spirit of his dream. From slight attentions in the first instance, he became gradually wrapt up in his boy. He was proud of him, of his beauty, his winning manners, and the early development of intelligence and observation. He was, too, his heir. Much depended on his life ; and to preserve that life now appeared to him all-important.

He was much with him, watched over him with painful anxiety, and was at all times nervously susceptible on the subject of his health or safety. The child acquired over him a silent but powerful influence, and his company had often the effect of a charm, for a time at least dispelling the gloom which hung heavily on his spirit. When sitting absorbed and moody, the sound of his voice or footsteps would rouse him, the dark and contracted brow would relax, and the countenance assume a partial and temporary expression of interest and pleasure. As the boy advanced, his mind rapidly opened : his observation was quick and discriminating, and the precocious acuteness of his remarks, added to a lovely and amiable temper, increasingly endeared him to every one. As might be expected, he was deeply loved by his mother, who was often indebted to his hold on his father's heart for any appearance approaching nearer to kindness which he displayed towards her.

When distant, reserved, or repulsive, a look of painful inquisitiveness from the child would recall him to a greater amenity of behaviour; and the intuitive tact with which, at such moments, he would run into his father's arms, lay his head on his bosom, or gaze, smilingly and confidingly in his face, often surprised the bitter misanthrope into feelings to which he thought himself a stranger. How far the influence of the boy might have contributed permanently to the happiness of his mother we are left wholly to conjec ture. Her death, in his fifth year, removed her both from the meekly-endured, but bitterly-felt anguish of ill-requited affection, and from the alle viations and solaces of her child. Her constitution, naturally feeble and delicate, gave way under the pressure of concealed grief, and a third confinement under which she sank, consigned her and her still born infant to the grave.

How Henry Jones bore his bereavement none could tell. No one saw him shed a tear. His general bearing was rather of grave and respectful sorrow than of violent grief; but as to the real state of his feelings, no idea could be formed; he was impenetrable. The young Clif ford — for so he was named after the colonel, his grandfather — was overwhelmed with grief. He had loved his mother with all the ardour of which his age admitted. He had been, especially during his first years, almost her only companion, and from her he had received impressions which had greatly tended to form his already beautiful character. Her self a sincere Christian, and finding her best refuge under sorrow in her principles, she had not neglected to instil them into his mind. On such subjects she could have no sympathy with her husband; but with her child she could converse even at that tender age, and, at least, instruct, where difference in years might not admit of equal communion.

Her death, although she had long been declining, was at last sudden. So it appeared to poor Clifford; and the announcement of it threw him into a paroxysm of uncontrollable sorrow. He ran into her chamber, climbed up on the bed, kissed the motionless lips which had never moved to speak to him but in love, called her by the most endearing names he had been accustomed to employ, and besought her to open her eyes and look on her sorrowful boy. His anguish was so excessive, that his father, who heard his cries in another part of the mansion, rushed into the room, and in evident alarm ordered him to be immediately removed; at the same time giving strict orders that he should not be again allowed to enter the chamber of death. Once only was this command disobeyed. His nurse, who almost idolized her nursling, was prevailed on by his entreaties to risk her master's displeasure, and to accompany him to the room in which his mother lay, a few hours be fore her form would be for ever hidden from his view.

"I will make no noise, Sarah," he said ; " I will be as silent as my dear mamma is now ; I only wish to see her once more, it is very hard to forbid me to see her, especially for the last time." So saying, he stole silently to the chamber by the side ofhis nurse, with his finger raised as though he would impose a silence corresponding with the noiseless slumber of death. " Friend after friend departs : Who hath not lost a friend ? There is no union here of hearts, That finds not here an end." Montgomery. Who has not, on looking on a human coun tenance in death, imagined for a moment that the features moved, or that the process of respiration was going on, especially when the object was one with which we have been familiar in hfe ? Such are the lingering influences of habit, when the intelligent and communicating spirit is gone, and nothing remains but its perishable shrine.

Young Clifford was looking intently on the countenance. It was one of those which death makes more beautiful, and to which the draperied habiliments of the sepulchre give a melancholy grace. At last he said in a hurried whisper, " Sarah, Sarah, see — it moves, she is going to speak, I shall have her back — she is not dead !" "Hush, hush," cried his nurse in alarm ; "we shall be heard, and I shall be severely condemned for bringing you here." This appeal at once recalled him. His generous nature could not endure that any should suffer out of kindness to him. He was silent, he gazed again — the illusion was dissipated — all was cold, rigid, dead. He gave one more " Long, long look, And wept a last adieu." Some months had elapsed after the death of Mrs. Henry Jones, when young Clifford began to exhibit symptoms of that disease which is said to be the scourge of our island, and by which so many of the most fair and promising of our youth are an nually swept into the tomb.

A troublesome cough attended with fever, sudden flushings of the countenance, and other indications, raised the most pain ful apprehensions, especially in the mind of Henry Jones. It was soon evident to the medical attendants that the case was one of decided phthisis; and it was not long before Henry Jones arrived at the same agonizing conclusion. He became from that moment absolutely wretched. Lie had no resources. The consolations of religion he rejected with infidel repudiation. He had no friends. His intercourse with his own family was unfrequent. A cloud hung over them all — a gloomy and unex plained mystery. The colonel was kind but depressed. His mind secretly brooded over the past, his health was affected, and his appearance indicated that other influences besides advancing years had made him old.

Lady Jones was kind and considerate when she and her son met, but there was something in her manner which led to the surmise that she was neither satisfied nor happy* Charlotte Jones had been married some time to a gentleman of large fortune, her equal in rank, and of excellent character and disposition. She was residing in a distant part of the same county, and fully occupied with the cares of her firstborn. Henry Jones, moreover, could not feel perfectly easy at Maberley. He knew that his plans and practices were infamous, and, as guilt is always suspicious, he could never wholly divest himself of the impression that he was suspected. Still he paid occasional visits, chiefly for the purpose of keeping himself under the eye of the colonel, and of paying him those obsequious attentions which he thought necessary to preserve his favour.

But in all this there was no heart ; and Maberley Hall was not the place to which his bruised, but still haughty and unhumbled spirit could fly for consolation. He was a disbeliever in friendship, as the reader has been already apprized, and hence he sought and gained no friends. There was but one being in the world on whom the Sowings of his heart could gush unembittered with evil thoughts, and that was his son : he was his one sanctuary from the pursuit of avenging enmities — his one ark amidst the floodings of his own stormy passions. This cherished object was gliding from him. His being had been like a vision pure and beautiful, a har binger of better things, a monitor of holier feelings, but like a vision it was softening away, and gra dually mingling with the spiritual elements from which it had emerged.

Is it wonderful that such a loss should be anticipated with feelings of deso lation and horror ? What is a man — wifeless, childless, friendless, and, worse than all, without a God? What pride can sustain, what philosophy tranquillize him ? On what pillow of repose can he lay his throbbing temples and soothe the anguish of distraction ? " I'll carry thee In sorrow's arms to welcome misery. Heywood. Indifference to mankind, if not positive hatred of them, is not incompatible with very passionate attachment to one object, or to several, if children. The tiger will fondle and protect its young, and the serpent avenge its brood — and how many fathers and mothers too have we seen, who, cold, unfeeling, tyrannical to others, have been fond to doting folly of their own children. The explanation of this seeming anomaly is to be found in the selfishness of the heart.

Children are thews, they belong to them, they are elements in the gratification of self, the object for which they live, labour, and hope. We have seen parents, both men and women, who could - look on the miseries of others with indifference, if not with exultation ; who could see half a village of children borne away by some dis temper or malignine, with a cold remark, that it was, " perhaps, better for their parents that they were out of the way," but who would wail and yell, like the robbed tigress, at the loss of one of their own. Henry Jones was of this order. He was a stricken, but an unrepentant and unsubdued man ; and it is sad to say, that his griefs had no reference to compunction or regret for the evil he had medi tated and wrought. One incident, which occurred on the day to which the resumption of our tale refers, may be adduced as an illustration of the foregoing remarks.

On the return of Henry Jones from his miserable and disturbed walk, he went to the room where his son lay, and looking at him and perceiving the bright vermilion or hectic spot on his cheek, he sighed heavily, and seated himself again at the head of the couch. Clifford perceived his distress, and said with affectionate tenderness, not, however, unmixed with a kind of awe, if not fear, which his father's presence, notwithstanding his excessive fondness, had somehow produced — " Why do you seem so sorrowful, papa ? I feel better, and I think I shall soon be well ; but if not, we should submit, if it be the will of God. Mamma used to tell me that all things were for the best if they came from our heavenly Father, and I am sure she was not afraid to die." " It was very well, my dear," replied his father, " for mamma to think and speak so : it will be better for your health to have other thoughts.

You should think and talk on more cheerful subjects." " Yes, but papa," was the answer, " these thoughts are cheerful to me ; and if I am to die, I ought to become more and more familiar with them. My dear mamma is in Heaven, and I wish to be prepared to meet her there. Oh ! papa, I wish you would read and explain the Bible as she used to do ; it would be a great comfort to me, and I think it would to you. I have often seen mamma, when she was in tears, retire and read her Bible, and she told me it made her happy, and I am sure she looked happier. I have only Sarah now to read with me, and she is very good and kind; but she cannot talk with me so delightfully as mamma ; but you could explain many things I cannot under stand ; do, papa, indulge me in this ; I shall be so grateful if you will."

Henry Jones was much embarrassed; he felt the censure implied in the humble faith and piety of his child; but, though perplexed, he was not softened by it. " Another time, Clifford," he said, "we will talk of this; let us change the subject." The conversation closed, never again to be renewed on that theme. Time passed swiftly away, and with its advance the fatal disease increased its ravages. Day after day Henry Jones saw this plant of promise, like the gourd of the prophet, withering away. Those whose lot it has been in this world of mortality to watch the constant decline of a beloved object fading for the tomb, need no description of the daily and hourly sorrows it occasions. Each change in the countenance, every paroxysm of the cough — even the hopes mercifully granted to the sufferer in this protracted disorder — are all causes of keen distress to those who see the hand of Death gradually, but certainly, closing on his victim.

Henry Jones's unhappiness displayed itself in incessant, but brief and hurried visits to the chamber of liis son — until, at length, the hour of his departure arrived. Around his dying bed stood the Colonel and Lady Jones. They had both highly esteemed Mrs. Henry Jones, and were much attached to, and deeply interested in Clifford, more especially since the death of his mother. There were also in the room, the nurse and one of the medical attendants. Henry Jones was also there, but was seated with his eyes closed and his arms folded behind the drapery of the bed. Lady Jones had been constantly with the patient for two months past, and had conversed much on those subjects which most interested and consoled him. He was now wasted to a shadow; but his countenance had an almost unearthly beauty.

He looked as if a reflection of the celestial radiance was on him, by whose full splendour he was about to be surrounded. He was perfectly aware of his situation, but composed and collected. He spoke feebly but distinctly. He thanked Lady Jones with evident gratitude and love for her attentions, and assured her that she had greatly comforted his last days ; he also thanked the colonel for all his goodness, and then called Sarah, his old nurse, who was almost broken-hearted, and said to her — " And I thank you, too, dear Sarah ; you have always been kind to me : kiss me as you used to do, when you had me so long under your care — there — may God bless you, Sarah, and my dear papa will, I am sure, take care of you, for my sake." He then turned his head and said — " But where is papa ? Henry Jones rose and leaned over the bed, his whole frame trembling and his breast swelling with agony.

" Dear papa," whispered the dying boy, and throwing his atten uated arms round his neck, " I thank you for all you have done for me. Don't grieve; try and be happy." Then, lowering his whisper, he added, his eyes fighting up with the last blaze of life — " Be friends with uncle Philip, and with everybody, and then we shah meet with dear mamma — where there is neither sorrow nor death." These were his last words. The effort he had made exhausted the feeble remains of his strength : he fell back on his pillow and " the bitterness of death was past." When young Clifford Jones expired, a deep silence ensued, interrupted only by the sighs of Lady Jones and the sobs of Sarah the good nurse. Henry Jones stood fixed and motionless, as if petrified. Perhaps at this awful moment, the most striking figure in the group was the colonel.

He was now looking much older than when the reader last met with him. His hair was perfectly grey. He had still the lofty look which characterized him, but his countenance appeared careworn, and his figure was scarcely as erect as formerly. He stood gazing on the face of the dead child for some moments. He was a Jones in every lineament, and strongly resembled Philip. At length the colonel broke silence, while tears, which had not been seen to flow for years, filled his eyes. " Beautiful being !" he exclaimed, " thou art well released. Had I a child of thy age, I would rather see him die as thou hast died, and as young, than that he should hve to wear a ducal coronet." Henry Jones spoke not, wept not. To grief like his the relief of tears is not allowed. The heart is arid, withered, blasted ; it is neither moistened by the dews of mercy, nor irrigated by the showers of human sympathy.

A hard and irreligious heart is, under calamity, isolated and alone. No God pro pitiated, no friendships formed, no hopes cherished, there is no refuge in heaven or on earth ! Winter was upon his brow, and in his heart — the dark, the sombre, the hopeless winter of age ; with no bright spring to gladden the straining eye of expectation, no warmer season, no flowery hours beyond. If the behef of an immortal reunion were a fiction instead of being, as it is, the most animating and consolatory of Christian doctrines, the bereaved sufferer is an immense gainer by the illusion. He who rejects it sees in death a cold blank — the sudden and final obliteration of all the sympathies and associations of past relationship. The idea of restoration cannot be entertained to mitigate the severity of loss ; and there is nothing in the past, to which the memory can recur with a mournful but tender and soothing pleasure.

The gradual alleviations of time, by which the bitterness of the keenest bereavements is allayed, have no consoling effects. They may produce insensibility; but un connected with the anticipation of a brighter and happier future, divorced from every sentiment of piety and resignation, their best effect is to produce oblivion. But there are some minds that cannot forget. To them the mercy of forgetfulness, if such it may be called, is denied. It is, in its degree, the undying memory of the doomed. The tablet is ever there — not a record, not a character MABERLEV. 17 erased — a perpetual accusation, an everlasting reproach ! Henry Jones had not seen the body of his child since he breathed his last. He remained secluded in a darkened chamber, relieved only by the glimmer of a solitary lamp. He conversed with no one — took his food, or rather received it, for it was seldom touched, in silence.

He was heard to pace the room for hours, but no sound escaped him that was audible to others. His mind, however, was not inactive. He thought deeply, bitterly. He had a sense of injury, as though his rebellious spirit would arraign, were not the impiety bootless, as his arm was impotent, the Providence which chas tised him. On the night previous to the interment, a knock was heard at the door of his gloomy retreat, and when the command to enter was given, Sarah appeared, and asked timidly whether he would wish to see "her young master before his coffins were closed ?" " No," he answered briefly ; but immediately added, with more kindness of tone, remembering the attachment of his child to the nurse, "No, Sarah ; the jewel is gone, and I have no wish to see the casket." "Yes, sir," replied the woman, "my dear young master is no more, but his spirit lives ; and if I may be so bold to say it, his dear, beautiful little body will rise again, and be still more beautiful — it will be a glorious body, like his who declares that He is ' the resurrection and the life.' Do not be angry with me, sir, for I did love him as if he had been my own child.

Oh ! sir, you cannot know how a VOL. ii. woman clings to the babe that has hung at her breast ! And then he was such a good, kind, noble child — he loved every one, and above aU, he loved and feared God. Death does not seem at all dreadful when I look on him — he lies so calm and sweet, and the lips which have so often felt warm at my breast, seem as if they would move and say something kind to me." Thus the poor woman proceeded, her tears flow ing with her speech. She was a good, sensible, and affectionate creature, and her feelings made her voluble — may we not say eloquent ? Henry Jones waved his hand, and said, " You may go, Sarah, I shall not see the body again. Say no more, I shall not forget your young master's request about you." The nurse retired. The Colonel and Lady Jones, though of high and aristocratic birth, were not amongst the number who leave those they are bound to love and cherish when sick to the care of the nurse and the physician, and when dead to those who mourn for hire.