Duty and Inclination/Chapter 60
CHAPTER XVII.
"Our reformation, glittering o'er our fault,
Like to bright metal on a sullen ground,
Doth draw more homage, and attract more eyes,
Than that which hath no foil to set it off."
After some days' absence, immediately upon the return of Doctor Lovesworth to the Hermitage, he failed not to call upon his friends at the Bower. He expressed himself highly pleased with his visit, which in the course of a short period he had consented to renew, but upon condition only of his being favoured, for a few days during the intermediate period, by the company of Colonel Douglas.
"The pleasure of seeing Mrs. Melbourne was quite unexpected," said he, "not having had the least intimation of her return from abroad, or that she was with her sister, Mrs. Boville, whom I had the satisfaction to settle in this our pleasing vicinity about twelve months since; you may recollect the circumstance, General, as calling me away from London during the period of your stay there. My duty to Mrs. Boville, as my step-mother, demanded of me a greater punctuality in my correspondence and visits than I have fulfilled, but in stating to her the causes of my seeming negligence of her she has forgiven me. Indeed, I was meditating a trip to see her, and which my rencontre with Mrs. Melbourne hastened. Had I done so sooner, we should not have been at a loss," added he, turning to Rosilia, "to have discovered the origin of your little favourite Rose. I never in my life passed a more agreeable time. I had much pleasing conversation with the ladies; but the subject upon which they most delighted to dwell was the virtues of Colonel Douglas, whom Mrs. Melbourne affectionately styles her son, from his having espoused, it seems, her protégée, and whom she had been pleased to call her adopted daughter. Colonel Douglas has but recently returned with her from India, where by great personal merit and ability in his profession he has obtained very rapid promotion. He is a noble fellow truly; his dignified stature, the commanding graces of his person, are surpassed alone, in my estimation, by the superior lustre of his mind. To the most extensive knowledge of men and things, acquired by study, travel, and observation, he unites a peculiar urbanity of manner, which insensibly wins upon the esteem. I remember to have seen Ellina Airey when she was but a child; she appeared by no means promising, sufficiently so at least as to render her in after years calculated for the wife of Douglas. I might have been mistaken; under the tuition of a loving and beloved husband, her expansion of mind might have been considerable. Called from him under circumstances the most painful and interesting, Mrs. Melbourne assured me, his resignation only to the Divine will, enabled him to surmount such a trial. Nevertheless, from the remarks I gathered as to the general character of her protégée, I do not think she was a partner altogether suited to Douglas. The understanding of her husband could have been but imperfectly appreciated by her, since in many respects their tastes differed. A man who wishes to enjoy the conjugal state in its perfect bliss, should select for his partner (if haply amidst the crowd he should find such a one,) the female whose capacity is best suited to admire, exalt, and take delight in his attainments, to whatever branch of learning, literature, art, or science they are directed; not that it is necessary she herself should be skilled in such, but that her tastes should so incline as to afford her a strong relish for her husband's acquirements. Nothing can induce me to imagine that it is in the bright scenes of prosperity affection is proved, in those circles where the attention of each is divided by a thousand splendid trifles, by a succession of events as unimportant as they are useless. It is in the quiet and more social scenes of life that the lovely and affectionate wife clings to her partner, and he becomes her prop; the distracting cares of the world, indeed, may have robbed her, for a season, of those domestic joys she had been ever seeking to perpetuate; and though the mind of her husband, relaxed for a time, had seemed to become insensible to those satisfactions to be derived only from a married life, yet the time approaches when she recovers her ascendancy,—when the tie which unites them is bound together still closer,—and every trial they had mutually experienced serves but to renew their friendship, increase their confidence, and link their souls in that mutual union they hope may never be dissolved."
Rosilia's bosom, at such a picture, swelled and throbbed with a high-fraught sense of delight; while, having spoken from his own experience, a tear to the memory of his departed consort bedewed his cheek.
Mrs. De Brooke asked if he knew the cause which had deprived Douglas of his wife.
"In giving birth to that innocent my dear Rosilia and myself discovered in one of our morning rambles, and which became afterwards so great a favourite with her." The tears of Rosilia bespoke her sensibihty upon the occasion. "Mrs. Melbourne told me," he continued, "his grief, under such an afflicting cause, if not extravagant, was extremely severe; and that if it had not been from consolations and supports far above human aid, she believes he would have sunk under the stroke. By all she says of him, he must have made the best of husbands. Indeed, nothing of the account she gave of him seemed in the least exaggerated; for being permitted to enter the little sanctuary of his retirement, called his study, everything around presented the delights arising from infinite resource; everything I saw breathed upon my soul an intellectual harmony, an unutterable pleasure; the solid charms of literature, but above all, the master of this little paradise, enchanted, whilst they riveted my attention with delight unspeakable."
Such unequivocal praise and high commendations from Dr. Lovesworth, a man of such exalted worth and superior character, sunk deep into Rosilia's mind and heart, arousing into energy her every latent and inmost feeling. No longer then was it sentiment triumphing over reason; it was the joint concurrence of each. Her affections and understanding, no longer at variance, mingled together in delightful concord, giving to her soul that placidity, that inward joy, she might have imagined to exist, but had never before experienced.
Douglas, when invested with all the brilliancy of health, animation, and manhood's ripened vigour, excited her admiration, but never those lively sentiments of esteem, respect, and regard, as Douglas faded in person, repairing his errors, alive to truth, and to the consciousness that virtue alone is truly great and noble. His talents, ever shining, were now still more improved by that delicacy of taste, refinement of soul,—that quick sensibility of what was right or wrong we may in vain seek for but in those whose hearts are formed, not to applaud only, but to discern and deeply to feel and acknowledge the transcendant beauty of moral wisdom.
"Will jou, my dear Doctor," said the General, "when Colonel Douglas visits you, tell him how happy I shall feel myself to renew my acquaintance with him, and to shake him cordially by the hand. For my own part, I am free to confess it, I ever felt a predilection for Douglas; the ingenuousness of his manners, so wholly opposed to art or dissimulation, the honourable and candid manner in which he confided in me upon a domestic and family affair, left, I can assure you, its due impressions upon me: but this we need not dwell upon."
The Doctor having promised to recall the General to the recollection of Douglas, set off on his walk back to the Hermitage, where Colonel Douglas duly arrived, according to the invitation he had received, for the purpose of spending a day or two.
Not wishing to delay the pleasure of seeing him, the General took an early occasion of paying his respects. Returning to his little family, highly gratified by his visit, the first address which broke from him was,
"This gallant which thou seest,
Was in the wreck; and, but he's something stain'd
"With grief, (that beauty's canker,) thou mightst call him
A goodly person.
"I might call him
A thing divine, for nothing natural
I ever saw so noble."
Such was the language of Miranda, and to which Rosilia's heart responded, as, deeply colourings she listened to what her father had more to advance.
"I have but one cause of regret," said he, "which is, that we shall lose Douglas out of the neighbourhood sooner than we anticipated; he intends to prolong his stay but a few weeks, for the purpose of recovering his healthy and then to make an excursion into Scotland, to revisit his brother, Lord Deloraine, who, it seems, left our old dwelling Mount Zephyr to return to revisit the seat of his ancestors." The countenance of Rosilia expressed her disappointment, which increased upon her father adding, "It appears that, since the loss of his wife, Douglas is more than ever wedded to his profession. I was much pleased in hearing him express himself in the words of a true patriot: if he were not born in England, he had the happiness of being introduced into it at a very early period of his life; the greater part of his friends were English; his first affections had been nurtured in it; that he regarded it in the light of a mother soil; its union with Scotland, indeed, rendered it to him completely such; that as he had embarked in its service, he hoped to finish his career in its defence."
At these words Rosilia became still more agitated. The bright dawnings of affection and approving reason had insensibly taken possession of her; and now that the worth of Douglas had become so conspicuously manifest; when that impediment, the only one formerly existing to oppose an union with him, was now so entirely removed, that, sanctioned by a self-approving conscience, she could have felt herself free to have indulged attachment for him; now, when her heart had dilated with the idea of becoming his future companion, of mitigating his sorrows, and of sharing his joys,—"How vain, how wrong, how censurable, to have allowed thought, busy and active thought, thus to wander! How erroneous in her to imagine that the former attachment which Douglas professed for her might revive!—had he not been wedded, and attached to another!" she mentally ejaculated.
In losing his wife, Douglas, if he had not been passionately enamoured of her, had loved her tenderly; and as he had conceived his destiny would for ever oppose an union with Rosilia, the first and only female capable of truly and deeply assimilating with his mind and its affections, he had resolved entirely to devote himself to his profession, and give up every future idea of forming a second time the matrimonial tie.
Previous to his having become a widower, he had an occasion of renewing a friendship with one who had been a student with him in his days of youth, the recollection of which, together with meeting abroad, naturally helped to strengthen the intimacy formerly existing. Douglas, however, perceived a sensible alteration in the manners of his friend since he had assumed the title of manhood. He had always known him to possess eccentricity of character, tinctured with romance—a heart sensitive, a fancy warm, a penetration acute; those endowments were now often obscured by a deep reserve, causing Douglas to entertain the supposition that, in addition to a natural bias to melancholy, sorrow and disappointment might have also crossed his path; circumstances which, though far from being anxious to dive into, accident discovered he was not mistaken in.
"Though but a giddy youth," said Douglas to him one dav, "I once remember to have been much delighted by a small poem you had composed upon the subject of a youth, immersed in business during the week, escaping on a Sunday from the noise and confusion of a busy town, to wander, Arcadian-like, amidst groves, and breathing forth upon the occasion the romantic enthusiasm of his soul. Chance brought him to a spot where he discovered a female of such exquisite grace and beauty that he became instantly enamoured. The story was wrought up in a manner, that the fair one returned his passion; and the bliss of the lovers upon the occasion was very happily described. I remember you seemed completely under poetical inspiration, such a glow of language followed, so much energy you threw into the detail."
"Alas!" returned his friend, "I was then new to life, and the happiness I painted was from those pristine colourings the heart glows with ere it meets with disappointment. The subject was pleasing, and I had deluded myself with the fond hope that such joys might be one day mine."
"It is rarely in human life," rejoined Douglas, "we realize the inimitable paintings our imaginations form, and less so during the effervescent period of youth. The bright impression glows upon the fancy, ravishes the mental view, but ere long vanishes, and leaves the prospect desolate and forlorn."
"Pardon me," said his friend, "you have struck upon a chord which for one short moment vibrates to a sense of joy. I have beheld an object the prototype of the female I had painted; myself, like the youth in the fable, became instantly enamoured, my ideas absorbed by her image; and in the fervour of a new-born passion, I hovered around this enchantress, as though unable to breathe or to support existence but in the beatitudes of her sphere; but unlike the termination of my story, notwithstanding every attempt I made to be admitted to her presence, the irresistible impulse which impelled me to disclose the powerful yet delicate sentiment, the perfect homage with which her pure loveliness had inspired me, was checked with the harsh-sounding, the prophetic words, jarring like discord in my ears, pronounced by that woman Herbert whose house she inhabited, 'That Miss De Brooke (Rosilia De Brooke was her name,) 'was engaged, from years of infancy, to her son, Edward Herbert'"
"Gracious heavens!" in his turn exclaimed Douglas, half starting from his seat, "Ro—si—lia De Brooke! Was it truly she?"
A sudden paleness overspread his cheeks; recollecting, however, that he was then the husband of another, he endeavoured to rally and divert from himself the keen glance of Harcourt,—for it was no other than he of whom we have before spoken,—which became almost insupportable, and said with emphasis, "Engaged to her son! Merciful powers! that such a creature should have been, doomed to bless the rude embrace of a Herbert—a mere stripling in mind as in form!"
"Just so unpromising a youth as I had imagined," continued Harcourt; "there lay the deadly bane that poisoned my repose. But you have been acquainted with her, then?"
"I have been," was the laconic reply of Douglas, who, after a few minutes' hesitation, added, "You will not wonder at the exclamation which escaped me, when I tell you how greatly the mother of that young man has duped you, there not existing the smallest ground of truth in the assertion she made you."
Douglas then entered upon a minute detail of all that had passed between himself and Herbert, whilst companions in the same vessel, upon their destination to India. Absorbed by the distraction of his ideas, while his mind gradually unfolded to the deceit which had been practised upon him, "What a harrowing tale you unfold!" ejaculated Harcourt; "what a cursed fraud! And thy own precipitancy, Harcourt,—oh, thy cursed precipitancy!"
"You should have made your pretensions known to her father," observed Douglas, with an emotion, though unnoticed by Harcourt, he vainly sought to suppress.
"Instead of listening to that cursed hag," burst from Harcourt: "but it may not be too late!" Tumultuous hope engrossed him, and rising with haste, "It may not be too late! a glad idea—an inspiring idea has seized me. I will address a letter to her father, General De Brooke. I will state to him the impression made upon me by his lovely daughter; expose to him the injury done me; state to him that it was the only cause, the only motive which prompted me to continue a profession I was about to relinquish for ever. In short, my pretensions shall be laid candidly before him, and he will find that the fair Rosilia has no ignoble suitor in the impassioned and admiring Harcourt!"
Thus having vented the impetuosity of his feelings, though under scarcely less excitement, he relapsed into meditation; he considered the probable lapse of time that would intervene ere an answer could be obtained; time and distance were taken into his close calculation, as also the probable unsuccessful issue of the measure, involved in duties which he felt it would be then dishonourable to shrink from.
Breaking silence, and with looks disturbed and agitated, "How afflicting is my situation!" exclaimed he; "I have a second time embarked myself in this hateful profession, one wholly foreign to my choice: but since I have engaged in arms, and difficulties and dangers innumerable surround me to shake my energies and frustrate my resolutions, no plausible reason left me to indulge in hope, I have nothing left but to make use of arms, to submit to their sanguinary strife, to await the struggle anticipated, the issue of the engagement likely to take place between us and the native chiefs—a convulsive shock it will be, no doubt,—when I will serve the British cause to the last drop in my veins. Harcourt in that day shall become renowned as a warrior, but it shall be the last of his fame!"
Such was Harcourt—warm, inflammable, ever transported by the extremes of enthusiasm.
Douglas having, in his devoted attachment to Rosilia, experienced equal sorrow and hope, fear and trial, as Harcourt,—in his contemplation, lost in the painful retrospect of the past, as connected with himself, and at the same time responding with heartfelt sympathy to the strong emotions he witnessed in his friend, he found it no easy task to calm and collect his thoughts: yet as he was now placed beyond the possibility of rivalship, he at last summoned sufficient firmness to his aid, and made use of every argument sincere friendship could dictate towards reducing the feelings of Harcourt to moderation, when they parted.