Arthur Mervyn or Memoirs of the Year 1793
Copyright© 2024 by Charles Brockden Brown
Chapter 45
The reading of this letter, though it made me mournful, did not hinder me from paying the visit I intended. My friend noticed my discomposure.
“What, Arthur! thou art quite the ‘penseroso’ to-night. Come, let me cheer thee with a song. Thou shalt have thy favourite ditty.” She stepped to the instrument, and, with more than airy lightness, touched and sung:—
“Now knit hands and beat the ground
In a light, fantastic round,
Till the telltale sun descry
Our conceal’d solemnity.”
Her music, though blithsome and aerial, was not sufficient for the end. My cheerfulness would not return even at her bidding. She again noticed my sedateness, and inquired into the cause.
“This girl of mine,” said I, “has infected me with her own sadness. There is a letter I have just received.” She took it and began to read.
Meanwhile, I placed myself before her, and fixed my eyes steadfastly upon her features. There is no book in which I read with more pleasure than the face of woman. That is generally more full of meaning, and of better meaning too, than the hard and inflexible lineaments of man; and this woman’s face has no parallel.
She read it with visible emotion. Having gone through it, she did not lift her eye from the paper, but continued silent, as if buried in thought. After some time, (for I would not interrupt the pause, ) she addressed me thus:—
“This girl seems to be very anxious to be with you.”
“As much as I am that she should be so.” My friend’s countenance betrayed some perplexity. As soon as I perceived it, I said, “Why are you thus grave?” Some little confusion appeared, as if she would not have her gravity discovered. “There again,” said I, “new tokens in your face, my good mamma, of something which you will not mention. Yet, sooth to say, this is not your first perplexity. I have noticed it before, and wondered. It happens only when my Bess is introduced. Something in relation to her it must be, but what I cannot imagine. Why does her name, particularly, make you thoughtful, disturbed, dejected? There now—but I must know the reason. You don’t agree with me in my notions of this girl, I fear, and you will not disclose your thoughts.”
By this time, she had gained her usual composure, and, without noticing my comments on her looks, said, “Since you are both of one mind, why does she not leave the country?”
“That cannot be, I believe. Mrs. Stevens says it would be disreputable. I am no proficient in etiquette, and must, therefore, in affairs of this kind, be guided by those who are. But would to heaven I were truly her father or brother! Then all difficulties would be done away.”
“Can you seriously wish that?”
“Why, no. I believe it would be more rational to wish that the world would suffer me to act the fatherly or brotherly part, without the relationship.”
“And is that the only part you wish to act towards this girl?”
“Certainly, the only part.”
“You surprise me. Have you not confessed your love for her?”
“I do love her. There is nothing upon earth more dear to me than my Bess.”
“But love is of different kinds. She was loved by her father——”
“Less than by me. He was a good man, but not of lively feelings. Besides, he had another daughter, and they shared his love between them; but she has no sister to share my love. Calamity, too, has endeared her to me; I am all her consolation, dependence, and hope, and nothing, surely, can induce me to abandon her.”
“Her reliance upon you for happiness,” replied my friend, with a sigh, “is plain enough.”
“It is; but why that sigh? And yet I understand it. It remonstrates with me on my incapacity for her support. I know it well, but it is wrong to be cast down. I have youth, health, and spirits, and ought not to despair of living for my own benefit and hers; but you sigh again, and it is impossible to keep my courage when you sigh. Do tell me what you mean by it.”
“You partly guessed the cause. She trusts to you for happiness, but I somewhat suspect she trusts in vain.”
“In vain! I beseech you, tell me why you think so.”
“You say you love her: why then not make her your wife?”
“My wife! Surely her extreme youth, and my destitute condition, will account for that.”
“She is fifteen; the age of delicate fervour, of inartificial love, and suitable enough for marriage. As to your condition, you may live more easily together than apart. She has no false taste or perverse desires to gratify. She has been trained in simple modes and habits. Besides, that objection can be removed another way. But are these all your objections?”
“Her youth I object to, merely in connection with her mind. She is too little improved to be my wife. She wants that solidity of mind, that maturity of intelligence which ten years more may possibly give her, but which she cannot have at this age.”
“You are a very prudential youth: then you are willing to wait ten years for a wife?”
“Does that follow? Because my Bess will not be qualified for wedlock in less time, does it follow that I must wait for her?”
“I spoke on the supposition that you loved her.”
“And that is true; but love is satisfied with studying her happiness as her father or brother. Some years hence, perhaps in half a year, (for this passion, called wedded or marriage-wishing love, is of sudden growth, ) my mind may change and nothing may content me but to have Bess for my wife. Yet I do not expect it.”
“Then you are determined against marriage with this girl?”
“Of course; until that love comes which I feel not now; but which, no doubt, will come, when Bess has had the benefit of five or eight years more, unless previously excited by another.”
“All this is strange, Arthur. I have heretofore supposed that you actually loved (I mean with the marriage-seeking passion) your Bess.”
“I believe I once did; but it happened at a time when marriage was improper; in the life of her father and sister, and when I had never known in what female excellence consisted. Since that time my happier lot has cast me among women so far above Eliza Hadwin, —so far above, and so widely different from any thing which time is likely to make her, —that, I own, nothing appears more unlikely than that I shall ever love her.”
“Are you not a little capricious in that respect, my good friend? You have praised your Bess as rich in natural endowments; as having an artless purity and rectitude of mind, which somewhat supersedes the use of formal education; as being full of sweetness and tenderness, and in her person a very angel of loveliness.”
“All that is true. I never saw features and shape so delicately beautiful; I never knew so young a mind so quick-sighted and so firm; but, nevertheless, she is not the creature whom I would call my wife. My bosom-slave; counsellor; friend; the mother; the pattern; the tutoress of my children, must be a different creature.”
“But what are the attributes of this desirable which Bess wants?”
“Every thing she wants. Age, capacity, acquirements, person, features, hair, complexion, all, all are different from this girl’s.”
“And pray of what kind may they be?”
“I cannot portray them in words—but yes, I can:—The creature whom I shall worship:—it sounds oddly, but, I verily believe, the sentiment which I shall feel for my wife will be more akin to worship than any thing else. I shall never love but such a creature as I now image to myself, and such a creature will deserve, or almost deserve, worship. But this creature, I was going to say, must be the exact counterpart, my good mamma—of yourself.”
This was said very earnestly, and with eyes and manner that fully expressed my earnestness; perhaps my expressions were unwittingly strong and emphatic, for she started and blushed, but the cause of her discomposure, whatever it was, was quickly removed, and she said, —
“Poor Bess! This will be sad news to thee!”
“Heaven forbid!” said I; “of what moment can my opinions be to her?”
“Strange questioner that thou art. Thou knowest that her gentle heart is touched with love. See how it shows itself in the tender and inimitable strain of this epistle. Does not this sweet ingenuousness bewitch you?”
“It does so, and I love, beyond expression, the sweet girl; but my love is, in some inconceivable way, different from the passion which that other creature will produce. She is no stranger to my thoughts. I will impart every thought over and over to her. I question not but I shall make her happy without forfeiting my own.”
“Would marriage with her be a forfeiture of your happiness?”
“Not absolutely or forever, I believe. I love her company. Her absence for a long time is irksome. I cannot express the delight with which I see and hear her. To mark her features, beaming with vivacity; playful in her pleasures; to hold her in my arms, and listen to her prattle, always musically voluble, always sweetly tender, or artlessly intelligent—and this you will say is the dearest privilege of marriage; and so it is; and dearly should I prize it; and yet, I fear my heart would droop as often as that other image should occur to my fancy. For then, you know, it would occur as something never to be possessed by me.
“Now, this image might, indeed, seldom occur. The intervals, at least, would be serene. It would be my interest to prolong these intervals as much as possible, and my endeavours to this end would, no doubt, have some effect. Besides, the bitterness of this reflection would be lessened by contemplating, at the same time, the happiness of my beloved girl.
“I should likewise have to remember, that to continue unmarried would not necessarily secure me the possession of the other good——”
“But these reflections, my friend,” (broke she in upon me, ) “are of as much force to induce you to marry, as to reconcile you to a marriage already contracted.”
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