LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 548, 21 March 1876, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THE OLYTIE. Chapter I. ( Continued.) She finished writing, and was about to close her letter, when a fresh thought struck her, and she continued; ‘ It is said, not without some truth in my case, that the most important part of a woman’s letter lies in the odd piece of intelligence she just remembers when it is about fo be posted. I was going to omit telling you that I know nothing whatever about Mr Faithfull, except that Harry Nugent says he is a man of good means and family in the North ; beyond this, he is so singularly reticent on all points concerning himself, that I do not know if he has a relation living. That he has been travelling for some time, is the single information he gives, and he is only warmed into communicativeness when on the subject of the countries he has visited. His reticence on other points is painfully tormenting, since it arouses all my curiosity to strive to fathom him. I sometimes think there is a mystery about him, for when he imagines himself unobserved, there comes into his face an expression of melancholy so profound, that it is with difficulty I restrain the longing I have felt at such times to snap the bands of conventionality, and ask him its cause ; for, alas ! as I have already told you, he sees but too well, I fear, that my heart is utterly his; and —but how can I describe to you the pain and shame of this disclosure ? —the more he sees it, the more he shrinks from me. Does he despise me ? I dread to ask the question of myself. * It is positively inhuman to despise a woman for the offering of her soul’s richest blossom, even if there is no heart left to pluck it. If he does not care for me, I feel that I have done nothing worthy of his contempt, for I have simply loved him beyond the power of my will to control. Love, the lord of all, has taken the helm of my small bark, and while he holds the rudder in his hand, I shall be kept floating ever on faithful waters. ‘ How I can see you smile as you read this, and suggest to yourself the necessity of coming to stay with me for a little, as you consider my case such a bad one that I am hardly responsible. Come, dear friend ; the Clytiehas unlooked my speech, and made me tell you all. It is more than probable that I shall need you, for loving as are those about me, the fear of paining them, especially my dear mother, forbids my disclosing all I have written to you ; and if the worst comes to the worst, and he goes away without a word, then, Amy, let me have you near me, that my heart may not be left to break utterly without sympathy. Human suffering has its depths, but I question if it has one, psychologically speaking, that will equal mine in such a case. Come, therefore, as soon as you can.’ * » * * * * Having at length written all she wished, she closed her letter, and sent it to the post. Feeling the vacuum left by the accomplishment of a pleasant duty, she sat back in her chair, and with her hands clasped across her eyes, indulged in a reverie. Marian Elton was a girl of twenty-five, in all the glory of early womanhood ; bright, fascinating, intelligent, and accomplished, she was the centre of attraction wherever she went. She had had more than one offer, from rich men, who would have given their wealth to endow her; and from poor men, who only asked to toil for her. But she was a woman * true to herself’ in her determination only to marry whom she loved; and there was not a man among those she rejected who did not feel thas they valued her more in her refusal of their love than its acceptance, if that were possible; for it showed them a true womanly nature, whose goodness converted their failure to win her love into friendship. She healed their wounds by making them feel, that though unsuccessful, they had not loved unworthily, which was flattering at least to their discernment, and upheld their self-respect: for if we are to be judged by the affections we aspire to gain, it is surely more ennobling to have aimed high even to failure, than to have sought and won only the inferior. Her reverie was interrupted by a startling double-knock at the hall door, and from her point of observation at the window, she saw that it was Leonard Faithfull who was calling. * Should she receive him ? Her mother was out. Perhaps he would not ask for her.’ Further surmise was cut short by his entering the room. She found it difficult to speak to him ; with her mind so intensely occupied as we have seen, calmness and an absence of self-consciousness were out of the question. Every nerve within her was vibrating so keenly that she felt cold and speechless with emotion. His embarrassment was scarcely less than her own, but it was the agitation of a man determined not to see or feel. They sat for some time making commonplace remarks about the weather and society, and then his eye fell upon the Clytie. ‘ Do you believe such constancy possible, Miss Elton ? Do you think the woman

lives, apart from mythology, who is capable of loving continuously where it is not returned ?’

He asked the question pointedly, almost savagely, she thought. Her quick, warm feelings were so shaken by it, that she replied nervously : ‘ It is more a question of experience and principle than of opinion, I fancy. If a woman thinks she has loved worthily, she would he doing violence to her better nature were she untrue to her faith. I can quite understand the constancy of Clytie, who could not be satisfied with or give her heart to other than the sun-god. Once she had become penetrated by the rays of his perfection, how was it possible she could offer the tribute of her highest love and worship to any lesser light ? Therefore the Clytie for me is but the symbol of the truth, that constancy to what one considers the noblest, becomes the law of necessity.’ He held his eyes on the ground while she spoke, nor raised them once whilst she uttered, with pathetic earnestness, a truth he had made her feel all too keenly. He offered no reply when she finished, and a pause ensued, which he was the first to break in a voice which repulsed all tenderness, as he said with apparent carelessness—' I am sorry Mrs Elton is not at home, for I called to wish you all good-bye. I resume my wanderings to-morrow, after having been a sad idler. This time, I am going west; I daresay you will hear of me as having come to grief in some of the wilds of South America. I fear I cannot stay until Mrs Elton returns,’ he added hurriedly, with averted eyes. Unable to meet her look of agony, he opened his watch, and then,, as if late, he said : ‘ I have several visits to pay, and must wish you good-bye. Miss Elton; kindly present my compliments and adieux to your family.’ She was just conscious that he took her hand, had shaken it coldly, and was gone ! —gone ! without even one kind word or look ! * Oh, how cruel! how inhuman !’ she exclaimed, as she flung herself into a chair, benumbed with an anguish that was tearless. ‘He is unworthy was her first decision, which buoyed her up with relentless endeavour to fling his memory from her heart; but all in vain ! He was the sun-god of her woman’s worship, towards whom her gaze would ever turn ; for the voice of her own soul, stronger than opinion, louder than fact, whispered she had not been mistaken and that he was worthy of her homage ; even though he left the blossom of her love to pine for ever on its stem. Chapter ii. Five long years had passed, each repeating its story of seasons, and still Marian Elton was unmarried. One suitor after another came and went, to the disappointment of her family and the wonder of her friends. Her faithful friend and confidant, Amy, alone knew the truth which her mother partially guessed when she used to say —‘ That Clytie has bewitched you Marian. I hope you are not grieving after some impossible hero. I declare, some day I shall enter into a conspiracy to throw her from her pedestal; you have never been the same girl since the day you bought her.’ To this, the only secret of her life, Marian offered no reply, for she knew her mother’s surmises were but too true, and she feared to pain her by confirming them. It must not be supposed, however, that she was unhappy all this while —far from it. After the first wild burst of sorrow was over she found consolation in duty, study, and the affection of those around her. To all these she returned with redoubled energy, and the result was, that at thirty years of age Marian Elton, so far from developing a tendency to old-maidishness, had ripened into a character of ennobled worth. The only problem people ever hazarded about her was ‘ why she never married.’ . Occasionally, when alone with her Clytie, the old sorrow would bleed anew, as she thought of the past, and the similarity of their fate. But suffering, she argued, though differing in intensity, was the lot of all. There was no life without its hidden wounds, some scarred over by the healing hand of Time; others, again, that would never cicatrise ; but one and all were bearing on their hearts some mark of painful encounter on the battle-field of life. Well is it for those who come forth from the strife * perfected through suffering ’ as did Marian Elton, Her friend Amy had married so happily that she never wearied urging upon her to let go the past, and find consolation in bestowing herself upon William Blakeney, who, with exemplary patience, was proving the truth of his determination never to take her ‘ No ’ for an answer. ‘lt is positively cruel of you, Marian, to waste his life as you are doing, all for an idea ? for as long as you are single he will never marry,’ said Amy, who at this time was on a visit to the Eltons. ‘lt is now five years,’ she continued, ‘ since that unfortunate craze of yours, and it seems to me you really are little short of a monomaniac, as you used to tell me to call you, to have preserved thus long the recollection of such an unpleasant abstraction—for he was nothing more.’ 1 Please, don’t talk of my marrying any one, Amy ;I am happier far as I am. Dear good Blakeney; I would do anything in the ■world to reward his kind faithfulness —anything, that is to say, but marry him. I have told him so repeatedly, and it is his own fault, not mine, that he continues as he does. But do not vex yourself about him; he knows my mind, and is content to be my very good friend.’ ‘ Content! No ; resigned you mean. He will never marry so long as you are single, I am sure he is only waiting to see what becomes of you.’ ‘ Poor man ! What unnecessary trouble to give himself on my account. I fear it will keep him occupied all his life, for this is a point upon which I am resolute, not from obstinacy, but necessity.’ ‘ I begin to believe that your mother is right, aud that yon Clytie has indeed bewitched you. You may depend upon it, Marian, that you are under a spell, which will not be broken until that unhappy little nymph falls a sacrifice. I have half a mind to b« the priestess who shall deal her the blow.’ They were sitting together working in Marian’s boudoir at the time, and the Clytie stood on a slight table near. Without the least intention of fulfilling her words, Amy pretending she was about to carry her design into execution, rose hastily in play, when her dress catching in a chair, she stumbled, and in her fall knocked over the table, and the little image fell to the ground ■mashed to pieces.’ j (To le continued.)