Books: Nature and Art
M >>
Mrs Inchbald >> Nature and Art
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 | 10 |
11
The jury consulted but a few minutes. The verdict was -
"Guilty."
She heard it with composure.
But when William placed the fatal velvet on his head, and rose to
pronounce her sentence, she started with a kind of convulsive
motion; retreated a step or two back, and, lifting up her hands,
with a scream exclaimed -
"Oh! not from YOU!"
The piercing shriek which accompanied these words prevented their
being heard by part of the audience; and those who heard them
thought little of their meaning, more than that they expressed her
fear of dying.
Serene and dignified, as if no such exclamation had been uttered,
William delivered the fatal speech, ending with, "Dead, dead, dead."
She fainted as he closed the period, and was carried back to prison
in a swoon; while he adjourned the court to go to dinner.
CHAPTER XLI.
If, unaffected by the scene he had witnessed, William sat down to
dinner with an appetite, let not the reader conceive that the most
distant suspicion had struck his mind of his ever having seen, much
less familiarly known, the poor offender whom he had just condemned.
Still this forgetfulness did not proceed from the want of memory for
Agnes. In every peevish or heavy hour passed with his wife, he was
sure to think of her: yet it was self-love, rather than love of
HER, that gave rise to these thoughts: he felt the lack of female
sympathy and tenderness to soften the fatigue of studious labour; to
sooth a sullen, a morose disposition--he felt he wanted comfort for
himself, but never once considered what were the wants of Agnes.
In the chagrin of a barren bed, he sometimes thought, too, even on
the child that Agnes bore him; but whether it were male or female,
whether a beggar in the streets, or dead--various and important
public occupations forbade him to waste time to inquire. Yet the
poor, the widow, and the orphan, frequently shared William's
ostentatious bounty. He was the president of many excellent
charities, gave largely, and sometimes instituted benevolent
societies for the unhappy; for he delighted to load the poor with
obligations, and the rich with praise.
There are persons like him, who love to do every good but that which
their immediate duty requires. There are servants who will serve
every one more cheerfully than their masters; there are men who will
distribute money liberally to all except their creditors; and there
are wives who will love all mankind better than their husbands.
Duty is a familiar word which has little effect upon an ordinary
mind; and as ordinary minds make a vast majority, we have acts of
generosity, valour, self-denial, and bounty, where smaller pains
would constitute greater virtues. Had William followed the COMMON
dictates of charity; had he adopted private pity, instead of public
munificence; had he cast an eye at home before he sought abroad for
objects of compassion, Agnes had been preserved from an ignominious
death, and he had been preserved from--REMORSE--the tortures of
which he for the first time proved, on reading a printed sheet of
paper, accidentally thrown in his way, a few days after he had left
the town in which he had condemned her to die.
"March the 12th, 179-
"The last dying words, speech, and confession; birth, parentage, and
education; life, character, and behaviour, of Agnes Primrose, who
was executed this morning, between the hours of ten and twelve,
pursuant to the sentence passed upon her by the Honourable Justice
Norwynne.
"Agnes Primrose was born of honest parents, in the village of
Anfield, in the county of--" [William started at the name of the
village and county]; "but being led astray by the arts and flattery
of seducing man, she fell from the paths of virtue, and took to bad
company, which instilled into her young heart all their evil ways,
and at length brought her to this untimely end. So she hopes her
death will be a warning to all young persons of her own sex, how
they listen to the praises and courtship of young men, especially of
those who are their betters; for they only court to deceive. But
the said Agnes freely forgives all persons who have done her injury,
or given her sorrow, from the young man who first won her heart to
the jury who found her guilty, and the judge who condemned her to
death.
"And she acknowledges the justice of her sentence, not only in
respect of the crime for which she suffers, but in regard to many
other heinous sins of which she has been guilty, more especially
that of once attempting to commit a murder upon her own helpless
child, for which guilt she now considers the vengeance of God has
overtaken her, to which she is patiently resigned, and departs in
peace and charity with all the world, praying the Lord to have mercy
on her parting soul."
"POSTSCRIPT TO THE CONFESSION.
"So great was this unhappy woman's terror of death, and the awful
judgment that was to follow, that when sentence was pronounced upon
her, she fell into a swoon, from that into convulsions, from which
she never entirely recovered, but was delirious to the time of her
execution, except that short interval in which she made her
confession to the clergyman who attended her. She has left one
child, a youth about sixteen, who has never forsaken his mother
during all the time of her imprisonment, but waited on her with true
filial duty; and no sooner was her fatal sentence passed than he
began to droop, and now lies dangerously ill near the prison from
which she is released by death. During the loss of her senses, the
said Agnes Primrose raved continually on this child; and, asking for
pen, ink, and paper, wrote an incoherent petition to the judge
recommending the youth to his protection and mercy. But
notwithstanding this insanity, she behaved with composure and
resignation when the fatal morning arrived in which she was to be
launched into eternity. She prayed devoutly during the last hour,
and seemed to have her whole mind fixed on the world to which she
was going. A crowd of spectators followed her to the fatal spot,
most of whom returned weeping at the recollection of the fervency
with which she prayed, and the impression which her dreadful state
seemed to make upon her."
* * *
No sooner had the name of "Anfield" struck William than a thousand
reflections and remembrances flashed on his mind to give him full
conviction whom it was he had judged and sentenced. He recollected
the sad remains of Agnes, such as he once had known her; and now he
wondered how his thoughts could have been absent from an object so
pitiable, so worthy of his attention, as not to give him even a
suspicion who she was, either from her name, or from her person,
during the whole trial!
But wonder, astonishment, horror, and every other sensation was
absorbed by--REMORSE: --it wounded, it stabbed, it rent his hard
heart, as it would do a tender one. It havocked on his firm
inflexible mind, as it would on a weak and pliant brain! Spirit of
Agnes! look down, and behold all your wrongs revenged! William
feels--REMORSE.
CHAPTER XLII.
A few momentary cessations from the pangs of a guilty conscience
were given to William, as soon as he had despatched a messenger to
the jail in which Agnes had been communed, to inquire after the son
she had left behind, and to give orders that immediate care should
be taken of him. He likewise charged the messenger to bring back
the petition she had addressed to him during her supposed insanity;
for he now experienced no trivial consolation in the thought that he
might possibly have it in his power to grant her a request.
The messenger returned with the written paper, which had been
considered by the persons to whom she had intrusted it, as the
distracted dictates of an insane mind; but proved to William, beyond
a doubt, that she was perfectly in her senses.
"TO LORD CHIEF JUSTICE NORWYNNE.
"My Lord,--I am Agnes Primrose, the daughter of John and Hannah
Primrose, of Anfield. My father and mother lived by the hill at the
side of the little brook where you used to fish, and so first saw
me.
"Pray, my lord, have mercy on my sorrows; pity me for the first
time, and spare my life. I know I have done wrong. I know it is
presumption in me to dare to apply to you, such a wicked and mean
wretch as I am; but, my lord, you once condescended to take notice
of me; and though I have been very wicked since that time, yet if
you would be so merciful as to spare my life, I promise to amend it
for the future. But if you think it proper I should die, I will be
resigned; but then I hope, I beg, I supplicate, that you will grant
my other petition. Pray, pray, my lord, if you cannot pardon me, be
merciful to the child I leave behind. What he will do when I am
gone, I don't know, for I have been the only friend he has had ever
since he was born. He was born, my lord, about sixteen years ago,
at Anfield, one summer a morning, and carried by your cousin, Mr.
Henry Norwynne, to Mr. Rymer's, the curate there; and I swore whose
child he was before the dean, and I did not take a false oath.
Indeed, indeed, my lord, I did not.
"I will say no more for fear this should not come safe to your hand,
for the people treat me as if I were mad; so I will say no more,
only this, that, whether I live or die, I forgive everybody, and I
hope everybody will forgive me. And I pray that God will take pity
on my son, if you refuse; but I hope you will not refuse. "AGNES
PRIMROSE."
William rejoiced, as he laid down the petition, that she had asked a
favour he could bestow; and hoped by his protection of the son to
redress, in some degree, the wrongs he had done the mother. He
instantly sent for the messenger into his apartment, and impatiently
asked, "If he had seen the boy, and given proper directions for his
care."
"I have given directions, sir, for his funeral."
"How!" cried William.
"He pined away ever since his mother was confined, and died two days
after her execution."
Robbed, by this news, of his only gleam of consolation--in the
consciousness of having done a mortal injury for which he never now
by any means could atone, he saw all his honours, all his riches,
all his proud selfish triumphs fade before him! They seemed like
airy nothings, which in rapture he would exchange for the peace of a
tranquil conscience!
He envied Agnes the death to which he first exposed, then condemned,
her. He envied her even the life she struggled through from his
neglect, and felt that his future days would be far less happy than
her former existence. He calculated with precision.
CHAPTER XLIII.
The progressive rise of William and fall of Agnes had now occupied
nearly the term of eighteen years. Added to these, another year
elapsed before the younger Henry completed the errand on which his
heart was fixed, and returned to England. Shipwreck, imprisonment,
and other ills to which the poor and unfriended traveller is
peculiarly exposed, detained the father and son in various remote
regions until the present period; and, for the last fifteen years,
denied them the means of all correspondence with their own country.
The elder Henry was now past sixty years of age, and the younger
almost beyond the prime of life. Still length of time had not
diminished, but rather had increased, their anxious longings for
their native home.
The sorrows, disappointments, and fatigues, which, throughout these
tedious years, were endured by the two Henrys, are of that dull
monotonous kind of suffering better omitted than described--mere
repetitions of the exile's woe, that shall give place to the
transporting joy of return from banishment! Yet, often as the
younger had reckoned, with impatient wishes, the hours which were
passed distant from her he loved, no sooner was his disastrous
voyage at an end, no sooner had his feet trod upon the shore of
Britain, than a thousand wounding fears made him almost doubt
whether it were happiness or misery he had obtained by his arrival.
If Rebecca were living, he knew it must be happiness; for his heart
dwelt with confidence on her faith, her unchanging sentiments. "But
death might possibly have ravished from his hopes what no mortal
power could have done." And thus the lover creates a rival in every
ill, rather than suffer his fears to remain inanimate.
The elder Henry had less to fear or to hope than his son; yet he
both feared and hoped with a sensibility that gave him great
anxiety. He hoped his brother would receive him with kindness,
after his long absence, and once more take his son cordially to his
favour. He longed impatiently to behold his brother; to see his
nephew; nay, in the ardour of the renewed affection he just now
felt, he thought even a distant view of Lady Clementina would be
grateful to his sight! But still, well remembering the pomp, the
state, the pride of William, he could not rely on HIS affection, so
much he knew that it depended on external circumstances to excite or
to extinguish his love. Not that he feared an absolute repulsion
from his brother; but he feared, what, to a delicate mind, is still
worse--reserved manners, cold looks, absent sentences, and all that
cruel retinue of indifference with which those who are beloved so
often wound the bosom that adores them.
By inquiring of their countrymen (whom they met as they approached
to the end of their voyage), concerning their relation the dean, the
two Henrys learned that he was well, and had for some years past
been exalted to the bishopric of--. This news gave them joy, while
it increased their fear of not receiving an affectionate welcome.
The younger Henry, on his landing, wrote immediately to his uncle,
acquainting him with his father's arrival in the most abject state
of poverty; he addressed his letter to the bishop's country
residence, where he knew, as it was the summer season, he would
certainly be. He and his father then set off on foot towards that
residence--a palace!
The bishop's palace was not situated above fifty miles from the port
where they had landed; and at a small inn about three miles from the
bishop's they proposed (as the letter to him intimated) to wait for
his answer before they intruded into his presence.
As they walked on their solitary journey, it was some small
consolation that no creature knew them.
"To be poor and ragged, father," the younger smilingly said, "is no
disgrace, no shame, thank Heaven, where the object is not known."
"True, my son," replied Henry; "and perhaps I feel myself much
happier now, unknowing and unknown to all but you, than I shall in
the presence of my fortunate brother and his family; for there,
confusion at my ill success through life may give me greater pain
than even my misfortunes have inflicted."
After uttering this reflection which had preyed upon his mind, he
sat down on the road side to rest his agitated limbs before he could
proceed farther. His son reasoned with him--gave him courage; and
now his hopes preponderated, till, after two days' journey, on
arriving at the inn where an answer from the bishop was expected, no
letter, no message had been left.
"He means to renounce us," said Henry, trembling, and whispering to
his son.
Without disclosing to the people of the house who they were, or from
whom the letter or the message they inquired for was to have come,
they retired, and consulted what steps they were now to pursue.
Previously to his writing to the bishop, the younger Henry's heart,
all his inclinations, had swayed him towards a visit to the village
in which was his uncle's former country-seat, the beloved village of
Anfield, but respect to him and duty to his father had made him
check those wishes; now they revived again, and, with the image of
Rebecca before his eyes, he warmly entreated his father to go with
him to Anfield, at present only thirty miles distant, and thence
write once more; then again wait the will of his uncle.
The father consented to this proposal, even glad to postpone the
visit to his dignified brother.
After a scanty repast, such as they had been long inured to, they
quitted the inn, and took the road towards Anfield.
CHAPTER XLIV.
It was about five in the afternoon of a summer's day, that Henry and
his son left the sign of the Mermaid to pursue their third day's
journey: the young man's spirits elated with the prospect of the
reception he should meet from Rebecca: the elder dejected at not
having received a speedy welcome from his brother.
The road which led to Anfield by the shortest course of necessity
took our travellers within sight of the bishop's palace. The
turrets appeared at a distance; and on the sudden turn round the
corner of a large plantation, the whole magnificent structure was at
once exhibited before his brother's astonished eyes. He was struck
with the grandeur of the habitation; and, totally forgetting all the
unkind, the contemptuous treatment he had ever received from its
owner (like the same Henry in his earlier years), smiled with a kind
of transport "that William was so great a man."
After this first joyous sensation was over, "Let us go a little
nearer, my son," said he; "no one will see us, I hope; or, if they
should, you can run and conceal yourself; and not a creature will
know me; even my brother would not know me thus altered; and I wish
to take a little farther view of his fine house, and all his
pleasure grounds."
Young Henry, though impatient to be gone, would not object to his
father's desire. They walked forward between a shady grove and a
purling rivulet, snuffed in odours from the jessamine banks, and
listened to the melody of an adjoining aviary.
The allurements of the spot seemed to enchain the elder Henry, and
he at length sauntered to the very avenue of the dwelling; but, just
as he had set his daring yet trembling feet upon the turf which led
to the palace gates, he suddenly stopped, on hearing, as he thought,
the village clock strike seven, which reminded him that evening drew
on, and it was time to go. He listened again, when he and his son,
both together, said, "It is the toll of the bell before some
funeral."
The signals of death, while they humble the rich, inspire the poor
with pride. The passing bell gave Henry a momentary sense of
equality; and he courageously stepped forward to the first winding
of the avenue.
He started back at the sight which presented itself.
A hearse--mourning coaches--mutes--plumed horses--with every other
token of the person's importance who was going to be committed to
the earth.
Scarcely had his terrified eyes been thus unexpectedly struck, when
a coffin borne by six men issued from the gates, and was deposited
in the waiting receptacle; while gentlemen in mourning went into the
different coaches.
A standard-bearer now appeared with an escutcheon, on which the keys
and mitre were displayed. Young Henry, upon this, pathetically
exclaimed, "My uncle! it is my uncle's funeral!"
Henry, his father, burst into tears.
The procession moved along.
The two Henrys, the only real mourners in the train, followed at a
little distance--in rags, but in tears.
The elder Henry's heart was nearly bursting; he longed to clasp the
dear remains of his brother without the dread of being spurned for
his presumption. He now could no longer remember him either as the
dean or bishop; but, leaping over that whole interval of pride and
arrogance, called only to his memory William, such as he knew him
when they lived at home together, together walked to London, and
there together almost perished for want.
They arrived at the church; and, while the coffin was placing in the
dreary vault, the weeping brother crept slowly after to the hideous
spot. His reflections now fixed on a different point. "Is this
possible?" said he to himself. "Is this the dean, whom I ever
feared? Is this the bishop, of whom within the present hour I stood
in awe? Is this William, whose every glance struck me with his
superiority? Alas, my brother! and is this horrid abode the reward
for all your aspiring efforts? Are these sepulchral trappings the
only testimonies of your greatness which you exhibit to me on my
return? Did you foresee an end like this, while you treated me, and
many more of your youthful companions, with haughtiness and
contempt; while you thought it becoming of your dignity to shun and
despise us? Where is the difference now between my departed wife
and you? Or, if there be a difference, she, perchance, has the
advantage. Ah, my poor brother! for distinction in the other world,
I trust, some of your anxious labours have been employed; for you
are now of less importance in this than when you and I first left
our native town, and hoped for nothing greater than to be suffered
to exist."
On their quitting the church, they inquired of the bystanders the
immediate cause of the bishop's death, and heard he had been
suddenly carried off by a raging fever.
Young Henry inquired "if Lady Clementina was at the palace, or Mr.
Norwynne?"
"The latter is there," he was answered by a poor woman; "but Lady
Clementina has been dead these four years."
"Dead! dead!" cried young Henry. "That worldly woman! quitted this
world for ever!"
"Yes," answered the stranger; "she caught cold by wearing a new-
fashioned dress that did not half cover her, wasted all away, and
died the miserablest object you ever heard of."
The person who gave this melancholy intelligence concluded it with a
hearty laugh, which would have surprised the two hearers if they had
not before observed that amongst all the village crowd that attended
to see this solemn show not one afflicted countenance appeared, not
one dejected look, not one watery eye. The pastor was scarcely
known to his flock; it was in London that his meridian lay, at the
levee of ministers, at the table of peers, at the drawing-rooms of
the great; and now his neglected parishioners paid his indifference
in kind.
The ceremony over, and the mourning suite departed, the spectators
dispersed with gibes and jeering faces from the sad spot; while the
Henrys, with heavy hearts, retraced their steps back towards the
palace. In their way, at the crossing of a stile, they met a poor
labourer returning from his day's work, who, looking earnestly at
the throng of persons who were leaving the churchyard, said to the
elder Henry--"Pray, master, what are all them folk gathered together
about? What's the matter there?"
"There has been a funeral," replied Henry.
"Oh, zooks! what! a burying!--ay, now I see it is; and I warrant of
our old bishop--I heard he was main ill. It is he they have been
putting into the ground! is not it?"
"Yes," said Henry.
"Why, then, so much the better."
"The better!" cried Henry.
"Yes, master; though I should be loth to be where he is now."
Henry started--"He was your pastor, man!"
"Ha! ha! ha! I should be sorry that my master's sheep, that are
feeding yonder, should have no better pastor--the fox would soon get
them all."
"You surely did not know him!"
"Not much, I can't say I did; for he was above speaking to poor
folks, unless they did any mischief--and then he was sure to take
notice of them."
"I believe he meant well," said Henry.
"As to what he meant, God only knows; but I know what he DID."
"And what did he?"
"Nothing at all for the poor."
"If any of them applied to him, no doubt--"
"Oh! they knew better than all that comes to; for if they asked for
anything, he was sure to have them sent to Bridewell, or the
workhouse. He used to say, 'THE WORKHOUSE WAS A FINE PLACE FOR A
POOR MAN--THE FOOD GOOD ENOUGH, AND ENOUGH OF IT;' yet he kept a
dainty table himself. His dogs, too, fared better than we poor. He
was vastly tender and good to all his horses and dogs, I WILL say
that for him; and to all brute beasts: he would not suffer them to
be either starved or struck--but he had no compassion for his
fellow-creatures."
"I am sensible you do him wrong."
"That HE is the best judge of by this time. He has sent many a poor
man to the house of correction; and now 'tis well if he has not got
a place there himself. Ha, ha, ha!"
The man was walking away, when Henry called to him--"Pray can you
tell me if the bishop's son be at the palace?"
"Oh, yes! you'll find master there treading in the old man's shoes,
as proud as Lucifer."
"Has he any children?"
"No, thank God! There's been enow of the name; and after the son is
gone, I hope we shall have no more of the breed."
"Is Mrs. Norwynne, the son's wife, at the palace?"
"What, master! did not you know what's become of her?"
"Any accident?--"
"Ha, ha, ha! yes. I can't help laughing--why, master, she made a
mistake, and went to another man's bed--and so her husband and she
were parted--and she has married the other man."
"Indeed!" cried Henry, amazed.
"Ay, indeed; but if it had been my wife or yours, the bishop would
have made her do penance in a white sheet; but as it was a lady,
why, it was all very well--and any one of us, that had been known to
talk about it, would have been sent to Bridewell straight. But we
DID talk, notwithstanding."
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 | 10 |
11