LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 364, 12 August 1875, Page 4

LITERATURE.

THE ATHELSTONS OP MORTE d’ ATHELSTON.

[From the Dublin University Magazine.) ( Continued. ) There is not the slightest doubt but that the under-housemaid would there and then have been at once seized with a fit of strong hysterics, except that it was so very evident that Job was frightened far beyond the power of rendering her any assistance, and altogether out of whatever amount ot wits he may have originally possessed ; consequently that sharp-witted young woman quickly perceived that it was not an occasion for the display of feminine weakness with anything like a satisiactory result; and the ghost having in the meantime seized Job by the arm, and given him a slight shake, just to bring him to, Dorcas only screamed, * Lord ’are mercy on hus, Capting Hathelston, wherever are you come from ?’ «I am glad to see you have some sense left,’ answered the Captain ; ‘ I am no ghost, as this good fellow seems to think I am; run quickly to the butler, and tell him to come at once to the ruins, and to bring a bottle of brandy; Lord Athelston has had a fit, and is lying there. Here, Job, do rouse yourself, and collect some of the men to bring down a litter to carry his lordship home ; and don’t look so scared, man, don’t you see I am alive ?’ , Job looked very doubtfully at the decidedly emaciated locking figure before him, whether in the body, or only in the spirit, he was by no means prepared to say. Nevertheless, he did as he was desired, spreading terror and dismay by his scared and bewildered-looking face, while Dorcas alarmed the house. Mr Sport procured the brandy and hurried off, followed by footmen and stable-boys, bearing blankets and poles wherewith to construct a hasty litter to bear their dying lord to his home. Old Mrs Binny, the housekeeper, quietly counting her pots of jam in her store-room, a favourite amusement of the old lady’s, was utterly collapsed and prostrated by the rather confused account, as given by Dorcas, of what had occurred, and that young woman’s repeated assurance, ‘ That it was the very first time in her life that ever she had been talking to Job, more particularly under that hespecial gable, which she—no, never in her life, ever once stopped under before—which was the merest haccident she did that blessed day in the goodness of Providence, and he, for all the world, like a ghost in gaiters, and an overcoat clinging hke an haspen leaf to him. Thereby not meaning Job, who is a very well spoken, discreet, young man, though me can hardly say, knowing him at all, as was returning, quite hinnocent-like, from seeing Mrs Obbs’ hinfant, a real hangel, taking its food beautiful, not thinking that me poor lord was lying dead on the cold green sward, leastways in a fit, with the wild ocean roaring round him,’ And then Dorcas did give way to the long-threatened hysterics, and throwing her apron over her head, rocked herself to and fro, howling dismally, in the housekeeper’s chair. Poor old Mrs Binny tried to collect her scattered faculties to understand what she could of Dorcas’ very unconnected tale, and t.Viink what was best be done. Three generations she had seen come and go since she bad entered those halls a buxom young woman, maid to my lord’s grandmother; and now, he who seemed but a young man to her was struck down. That much she understood, and she thought of the Lady Rowena, her nurseling, whom she had held in her arms for the dying Greek mother to kiss, and whom she had loved and tended when her own father seemed hardly to know or care whether she lived or died, —‘ Stop that noise,’ she cried angrily to the moaning damsel, ‘ and don’t disturb the house with your stuff! Oh !my poor child, my poor child I I must tell her myself, oh, how will she bear this second blow ?’ And the old woman hurried off to seek the Lady Rowena in the 'little boudoir where she usually sat, but no Lady Rowena was there; in vain she sought for her in her room, and In the library, from whose windows she could have seen the whole dreary procession as it wound along; but she was nowhere to be found, and the housekeeper, thankful that the girl had at least been spared that painful sight, closed the door and turned to seek her elsewhere, As she crossed the hall, she heard the tramp of many feet nearing the house, and there before her, coming down the great staircase, was the Lady Rowena herself, ‘Ah my lady, my lady ! don’t come here, don’t, my darling ! it is no sight for you,’ cried Mrs Binny wildly, ‘ Come in here, I want to tell you something; oh, my lady, come, do come !’ And she opened the door of the state drawingroom, all rolled up and smothered in grey linen, and tried to draw her young mistress inside.—Meanwhile the steps drew nearer, shuffling and stumbling more with the dead weight they bore, doubtless the sight she had so long schooled herself to see, and as the great doors opened, she gently but firmly pushed the housekeeper aside, and stepped out into the outer ball, There they had laid the litter down to rest; the old butler, with tears streaming from his eyes, was leaning over his dying lord, and grooms and footmen, with scared awe-stricken countenances, were crowding round him.—Her father, yes, she saw that at a glance, but standing by his side, tenderly holding the old man’s hand, stood one, the grim shadow of what he once had been ; for one short moment their eyes met, and then with a shriek so terrible that the dying man stirred uneasily on his pillow, the Lady Rowena fell upon the marble floor! Chapter V. The bustle aud excitement consequent upon the startling events of the day had, to a certain extent, subsided. The dying lord had been borne to his chamber, where he lay all unconscious, his poor eyes wandering restlessly, and his fingers plucking nervously at the heavy counterpane of the bed, which he never was to leave again till he was carried forth to join his dead wife, away in the lonely vault of the little church of Moite d’Athelston.

The village doctor kept anxious watch and ward, calculating the soonest possible time that Sir Gregory Powder, the great London physician, who had been telegraphed for, could arrive. ‘ I fear we shall have some time to wait yet,’ he said, addressing himself to Captain who never for one moment left the dying man’s side, ‘ I have done all that I really could do, I cannot say that I think even Sir Gregory Powder could do more; I fear, 1 greatly fear, that his lordship is past human j still, of course, it is a thing to

have Sir Gregory’s advice, a great thing, no doubtand the small doctor looked deprecatingly at Captain Athelston, but finding that that gentleman did not apparently even hear him, he muttered something about going to see his other patient, the Lady Rowena, and glided gently from the room. The village doctor spoke the truth ; not Sir Gregory nor any other man could tighten the silver cord that was fast loosening, nor mend the golden bowl that had been so ruthlessly broken. Still Captain Athelston sat watching silently, one hand holding that of the dying man, while ever and anon, gently, with tender touches as of a woman, he passed the other over the pale, white brow, smoothing rapidly into the calm peacefulness of death. In the library down below, whither she had been just carried, lay the Lady Rowena; for hours she had been laying in a strange kind of convulsion; her eyes were fixed in a wild, unnatural stare, and she seemed to writhe in inward agony, altogether baffling the art of healing as known to the small village practitioner, and utterly upsetting the theory of hartshorn and sal volatile hitherto considered infallible by Mrs Binny in all cases of feminine weakness. But she was quieter now, and the burning eyes were closed at last, and the bosom heaved and fell more regularly, but she had never spoken, and seemed utterly unconscious even of the presence of the faithful old servant, who was watching so anxiously by her side. ‘ Well, if ever I saw a curiouser affair from first to last,’ observed Miss Potts, stillroom maid, to Mr Jenkins, a colossal specimen of the flunky order, with highly developed calves, the routine of whose business had become so much a part of his mechanical nature, that in the midst of all the confusion of terror, and sorrow, and death, he was calmly lighting the great chandelier in the hall, and would probably have sounded the gong for dinner at the usual hour, if the aforesaid Miss Potts had not come to the rescue. /

‘ Well I never did,’ continued that voluble young person, ‘ to think how my lady is taking on screeching and screaming, and fainting for my lord, that was as stately and calm when the Captain was drowned, and he her own sweetheart as was to hare mar ried her, sanctioned by my lord. Mr Jenkins, la ! don’t you ever go to light up the place for all the world like a lumination.’ Mr Jenkins paused, flourishing his long lighted candle lighter in the air ; his countenance was serene, as he sarcastically observed—‘The Capting was her sweet’art, Miss Potts, the girls is hapt to think that sweetharts is as plentiful as blackberries, whereas pa’s with large properties is not.? Miss Potts, who had of late rather snubbed Mr Jenkins in favor of my lord’s own man, felt the sting conveyed in that slighted functionary’s remark. My lord was dying now, and my lord’s own man had not declared himself, and being a young woman of penetration, she at once saw the exigencies of her position, and not having the advantages enjoyed by the young ladies of the upper ten thousand, viz., either a mamma or some trustworthy chaperone to manage her affairs matrimonial for her, she was obliged to play her own little game in the best way she could, so she sighed audibly, giggled convulsively, and, rolling her black eyes sentimentally at her quondam adorer, exclaimed, * La, Mr Jenkins, how can you say so ? I am sure I think it is as how it is the gentlemen as is more inconsistent to their vows, leaving us poor girls to pine like doves on their withered stem.’ Here she wiped away a tear, which so stirred the depth of Mr Jenkins’ soul, that he would, undoubtedly, have been hurried into a declaration of his passion, if the little doctor, with his snuff-coloured wig all awry, and his spectacles hovering in apparently a most precarious situation on his nose, had not most inopportunely opened the library door, and addressed himself rather unceremoniously to that august individual, * I say, you flunky fellow, in calves, run quick and send Lady Rowena’s maid here. Stir yourself ! look alive !’ and the little man, being very much alive himself, disappeared with a celerity that was marvellous, and long before the astonished Mr Jenkins, slow of speech, though evidently quick of feelings, had recovered from his amazement and dismay—he, a London footman, six feet two in his stockings, to be addressed in such terms by a village apothecary, a thing not the height of his elbow—he actually seemed to swell with indignation till his very calves were almost bursting their delicate encasement of pinkish silk, and his eyes glazed with fierce rage at the closed door through which the audacious little wretch, who had so insulted him, had vanished. But Mr Jenkins’ wrath was impotent ; the village doctor was safe inside that door, and not having even Miss Potts to sympathize with him (that young damsel having fled at the first sound of the door handle turning, instinctively feeling that Mrs Binny would be down upon her, that excel • lent old lady, though having herself wooed the defunct Mr Binny, leaving that gentleman, it was very properly believed, very little choice in the matter, systematically setting her face against all courting and company keeping, as an idle and demoralizing custom to be suppressed with much severity), he was fain to smother his wrath, and do as he was bid. In the servants’ hall below stairs, there was a great collection of keepers, and other hangers on of the great house, who with their wives and families dropped in to discuss the startling events of the day, and join in the general mourning and lamentations. And, grief being dry work, there was strong ale consumed, while a select few mourned and regaled themselves on some of the dying lord’s best brown sherry in the butler’s own private apartment. It was there that Mr Jenkins found Mademoiselle Auralie, who had slipped away from her yOung lady for a few minutes, and having the last budget of information, was a person of consequent importance. Mr Sprot was in the act of uncorking a bottle of wine; nevertheless, they were genuine tears of sorrow that were flowing from his eyes, as he mournfully observed, while carefully dusting the mouth of the bottle, ‘ He was a kind master, a good landlord, and a true gentleman. Another glass, ma’m ?’ and he refilled buxom Mrs Flower’s glass, while that good lady sighed, and, seemingly unconscious in her sympathy of what she was doing, tossed off the invigorating fluid, and held out her glass for another; while her lord and master, head gardener, and highly respected on the estate, groaned acquiescence with the butler, albiet anxiously watching the effect of so much unaccustomed stimulant on the partner of his domestic joys. ‘ There Is the London doctor at last,’ cried one of the company, as the sound of wheels crunching on the gravel outside jwaa plainly

heard ; and Mr Sprot hurried off to meet the great Sir Gregory Powders, of world-wide reputation, who had come from London by special train, as he had been desired by telegraph to do; and now disencumbered of rugs and coats, and looking every inch the great man he was, he slowly ascended the chamber of death.

Too late ! Sir Gregory, too late ! Your carriage had scarcely turned in at the great gates, when the dying man, so long insensible, had suddenly wakened up, and glancing anxiously around him, had muttered a few words ; his own man standing near him could not hear what he said ; but Captain Athelston, leaning over him caught the broken sentences as they fell, ‘My child! my child ! so desolate ! forgive ! The merciful shall obtain mercy.’ The young man pressed the dying hand that lay in his; words were useless; he could not even tell if that mute sign had been understood ; and with solemn tread, as befitted the occasion, Sir Gregory stepped over to the bed; it needed but one glance of his experienced eye to see that all was over. * I regret to say,’ said the London physician, as he lightly felt the pulseless hand, that my utmost skill is unavailing here; but from what I see, I think it would have been so from the first. ’ Captain Athelston bowed his head, and the doctor continued in an inquiring tone, * His lordship, I fear, must have met with some great shock or sudden excitement : pressure on the brain, I should say, was the immediate cause of death, though the heart was, doubtless, affected also.’ What availed it now, what the cause, or how great the shock ? Nevertheless Captain Athelston answered, * Yes, you are right, he suddenly, and most unintentionally on my part, met me this afternoon, whom he had for some time supposed dead.’ Sir Gregory rubbed his hands, and said, ‘Ha! exactly so,’ in a self-satisfied tone. He had said the correct thing, and he seemed to grow quite cheery and pleasant under the influence of the bright tire and luxurious atmosphere of the chamber of death. But the doctor’s cheerfulness was not contagious; viewed professionally, everything was satisfactory, but to the young man who stood by the bed, a true friend was gone, and a heavy weight of grief, which for ever must remain unalleviated by human sympathy, lay sadly on his heart. To he continued.