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porch, where she had sat when Heaven in its mercy brought her to that

peaceful spot, she passed again; and the old church received her in its

quiet shade.

They carried her to one old nook, where she had many and many a time

sat musing, and laid their burden softly on the pavement. The light

streamed on it through the coloured window--a window, where the boughs

of trees were ever rustling in the summer, and where the birds sang

sweetly all day long. With every breath of air that stirred among

those branches in the sunshine, some trembling, changing light, would

fall upon her grave.

Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust! Many a young hand

dropped in its little wreath, many a stifled sob was heard. Some--and

they were not a few--knelt down. All were sincere and truthful in

their sorrow.

The service done, the mourners stood apart, and the villagers closed

round to look into the grave before the pavement-stone should be

replaced. One called to mind how he had seen her sitting on that very

spot, and how her book had fallen on her lap, and she was gazing with a

pensive face upon the sky. Another told, how he had wondered much that

one so delicate as she, should be so bold; how she had never feared to

enter the church alone at night, but had loved to linger there when all

was quiet, and even to climb the tower stair, with no more light than

that of the moon rays stealing through the loopholes in the thick old

wall. A whisper went about among the oldest, that she had seen and

talked with angels; and when they called to mind how she had looked,

and spoken, and her early death, some thought it might be so, indeed.

Thus, coming to the grave in little knots, and glancing down, and

giving place to others, and falling off in whispering groups of three

or four, the church was cleared in time, of all but the sexton and the

mourning friends.

They saw the vault covered, and the stone fixed down. Then, when the

dusk of evening had come on, and not a sound disturbed the sacred

stillness of the place--when the bright moon poured in her light on

tomb and monument, on pillar, wall, and arch, and most of all (it

seemed to them) upon her quiet grave--in that calm time, when outward

things and inward thoughts teem with assurances of immortality, and

worldly hopes and fears are humbled in the dust before them--then, with

tranquil and submissive hearts they turned away, and left the child

with God.

Oh! it is hard to take to heart the lesson that such deaths will teach,

but let no man reject it, for it is one that all must learn, and is a

mighty, universal Truth. When Death strikes down the innocent and

young, for every fragile form from which he lets the panting spirit

free, a hundred virtues rise, in shapes of mercy, charity, and love, to

walk the world, and bless it. Of every tear that sorrowing mortals

shed on such green graves, some good is born, some gentler nature

comes. In the Destroyer's steps there spring up bright creations that

defy his power, and his dark path becomes a way of light to Heaven.

It was late when the old man came home. The boy had led him to his own

dwelling, under some pretence, on their way back; and, rendered drowsy

by his long ramble and late want of rest, he had sunk into a deep sleep

by the fireside. He was perfectly exhausted, and they were careful not

to rouse him. The slumber held him a long time, and when he at length

awoke the moon was shining.

The younger brother, uneasy at his protracted absence, was watching at

the door for his coming, when he appeared in the pathway with his

little guide. He advanced to meet them, and tenderly obliging the old

man to lean upon his arm, conducted him with slow and trembling steps

towards the house.

He repaired to her chamber, straight. Not finding what he had left

there, he returned with distracted looks to the room in which they were

assembled. From that, he rushed into the schoolmaster's cottage,

calling her name. They followed close upon him, and when he had vainly

searched it, brought him home.

With such persuasive words as pity and affection could suggest, they

prevailed upon him to sit among them and hear what they should tell

him. Then endeavouring by every little artifice to prepare his mind

for what must come, and dwelling with many fervent words upon the happy

lot to which she had been removed, they told him, at last, the truth.

The moment it had passed their lips, he fell down among them like a

murdered man.

For many hours, they had little hope of his surviving; but grief is

strong, and he recovered.

If there be any who have never known the blank that follows death--the

weary void--the sense of desolation that will come upon the strongest

minds, when something familiar and beloved is missed at every turn--the

connection between inanimate and senseless things, and the object of

recollection, when every household god becomes a monument and every

room a grave--if there be any who have not known this, and proved it by

their own experience, they can never faintly guess how, for many days,

the old man pined and moped away the time, and wandered here and there

as seeking something, and had no comfort.

Whatever power of thought or memory he retained, was all bound up in

her. He never understood, or seemed to care to understand, about his

brother. To every endearment and attention he continued listless. If

they spoke to him on this, or any other theme--save one--he would hear

them patiently for awhile, then turn away, and go on seeking as before.

On that one theme, which was in his and all their minds, it was

impossible to touch. Dead! He could not hear or bear the word. The

slightest hint of it would throw him into a paroxysm, like that he had

had when it was first spoken. In what hope he lived, no man could

tell; but that he had some hope of finding her again--some faint and

shadowy hope, deferred from day to day, and making him from day to day

more sick and sore at heart--was plain to all.

They bethought them of a removal from the scene of this last sorrow; of

trying whether change of place would rouse or cheer him. His brother

sought the advice of those who were accounted skilful in such matters,

and they came and saw him. Some of the number staid upon the spot,

conversed with him when he would converse, and watched him as he

wandered up and down, alone and silent. Move him where they might,

they said, he would ever seek to get back there. His mind would run

upon that spot. If they confined him closely, and kept a strict guard

upon him, they might hold him prisoner, but if he could by any means

escape, he would surely wander back to that place, or die upon the road.

The boy, to whom he had submitted at first, had no longer any influence

with him. At times he would suffer the child to walk by his side, or

would even take such notice of his presence as giving him his hand, or

would stop to kiss his cheek, or pat him on the head. At other times,

he would entreat him--not unkindly--to be gone, and would not brook him

near. But, whether alone, or with this pliant friend, or with those

who would have given him, at any cost or sacrifice, some consolation or

some peace of mind, if happily the means could have been devised; he

was at all times the same--with no love or care for anything in life--a

broken-hearted man.

At length, they found, one day, that he had risen early, and, with his

knapsack on his back, his staff in hand, her own straw hat, and little

basket full of such things as she had been used to carry, was gone. As

they were making ready to pursue him far and wide, a frightened

schoolboy came who had seen him, but a moment before, sitting in the

church--upon her grave, he said.

They hastened there, and going softly to the door, espied him in the

attitude of one who waited patiently. They did not disturb him then,

but kept a watch upon him all that day. When it grew quite dark, he

rose and returned home, and went to bed, murmuring to himself, 'She

will come to-morrow!'

Upon the morrow he was there again from sunrise until night; and still

at night he laid him down to rest, and murmured, 'She will come

to-morrow!'

And thenceforth, every day, and all day long, he waited at her grave,

for her. How many pictures of new journeys over pleasant country, of

resting-places under the free broad sky, of rambles in the fields and

woods, and paths not often trodden--how many tones of that one

well-remembered voice, how many glimpses of the form, the fluttering

dress, the hair that waved so gaily in the wind--how many visions of

what had been, and what he hoped was yet to be--rose up before him, in

the old, dull, silent church! He never told them what he thought, or

where he went. He would sit with them at night, pondering with a

secret satisfaction, they could see, upon the flight that he and she

would take before night came again; and still they would hear him

whisper in his prayers, 'Lord! Let her come to-morrow!'

The last time was on a genial day in spring. He did not return at the

usual hour, and they went to seek him. He was lying dead upon the

stone.

They laid him by the side of her whom he had loved so well; and, in the

church where they had often prayed, and mused, and lingered hand in

hand, the child and the old man slept together.

CHAPTER 73

The magic reel, which, rolling on before, has led the chronicler thus

far, now slackens in its pace, and stops. It lies before the goal; the

pursuit is at an end.

It remains but to dismiss the leaders of the little crowd who have

borne us company upon the road, and so to close the journey.

Foremost among them, smooth Sampson Brass and Sally, arm in arm, claim

our polite attention.

Mr Sampson, then, being detained, as already has been shown, by the

justice upon whom he called, and being so strongly pressed to protract

his stay that he could by no means refuse, remained under his

protection for a considerable time, during which the great attention of

his entertainer kept him so extremely close, that he was quite lost to

society, and never even went abroad for exercise saving into a small

paved yard. So well, indeed, was his modest and retiring temper

understood by those with whom he had to deal, and so jealous were they

of his absence, that they required a kind of friendly bond to be

entered into by two substantial housekeepers, in the sum of fifteen

hundred pounds a-piece, before they would suffer him to quit their

hospitable roof--doubting, it appeared, that he would return, if once

let loose, on any other terms. Mr Brass, struck with the humour of

this jest, and carrying out its spirit to the utmost, sought from his

wide connection a pair of friends whose joint possessions fell some

halfpence short of fifteen pence, and proffered them as bail--for that

was the merry word agreed upon both sides. These gentlemen being

rejected after twenty-four hours' pleasantry, Mr Brass consented to

remain, and did remain, until a club of choice spirits called a Grand

jury (who were in the joke) summoned him to a trial before twelve other

wags for perjury and fraud, who in their turn found him guilty with a

most facetious joy,--nay, the very populace entered into the whim, and

when Mr Brass was moving in a hackney-coach towards the building where

these wags assembled, saluted him with rotten eggs and carcases of

kittens, and feigned to wish to tear him into shreds, which greatly

increased the comicality of the thing, and made him relish it the more,

no doubt.

To work this sportive vein still further, Mr Brass, by his counsel,

moved in arrest of judgment that he had been led to criminate himself,

by assurances of safety and promises of pardon, and claimed the

leniency which the law extends to such confiding natures as are thus

deluded. After solemn argument, this point (with others of a technical

nature, whose humorous extravagance it would be difficult to

exaggerate) was referred to the judges for their decision, Sampson

being meantime removed to his former quarters. Finally, some of the

points were given in Sampson's favour, and some against him; and the

upshot was, that, instead of being desired to travel for a time in

foreign parts, he was permitted to grace the mother country under

certain insignificant restrictions.

These were, that he should, for a term of years, reside in a spacious

mansion where several other gentlemen were lodged and boarded at the

public charge, who went clad in a sober uniform of grey turned up with

yellow, had their hair cut extremely short, and chiefly lived on gruel

and light soup. It was also required of him that he should partake of

their exercise of constantly ascending an endless flight of stairs;

and, lest his legs, unused to such exertion, should be weakened by it,

that he should wear upon one ankle an amulet or charm of iron. These

conditions being arranged, he was removed one evening to his new abode,

and enjoyed, in common with nine other gentlemen, and two ladies, the

privilege of being taken to his place of retirement in one of Royalty's

own carriages.

Over and above these trifling penalties, his name was erased and

blotted out from the roll of attorneys; which erasure has been always

held in these latter times to be a great degradation and reproach, and

to imply the commission of some amazing villany--as indeed it would

seem to be the case, when so many worthless names remain among its

better records, unmolested.

Of Sally Brass, conflicting rumours went abroad. Some said with

confidence that she had gone down to the docks in male attire, and had

become a female sailor; others darkly whispered that she had enlisted

as a private in the second regiment of Foot Guards, and had been seen

in uniform, and on duty, to wit, leaning on her musket and looking out

of a sentry-box in St James's Park, one evening. There were many such

whispers as these in circulation; but the truth appears to be that,

after the lapse of some five years (during which there is no direct