LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1359, 22 June 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

ONLY TOO TRUE.

(" Argosy.”) It was one of Mark’s cloudy days. That was what he called them when he felt ‘out of order, and couli not work. He had shut himself up in his studio and would not let mo enter it. I felt sad and heavy of heart—perhaps because no one needed my presence — and taking the needlework, from which it seemed my fingers were never to be free, I went out and sat down under the shade of the sweetbriar hedge, in sight of our neighbour, Mr Raymond’s, orchard, whose wealth of snowy bloom made all the air redolent with delicious scent.

It was a heavenly day, so fair, so pure, so peaceful. Although but May, and all things wearing the calm beauty of that early time, the day seemed intensified in its loveliness by that soft, rich tint of the skies, and dreamy hazinegs of atmosphere more peculiar to an Indian summer. In the first moment of my enjoyment of its beauty there came a mingling of disappointment that Marcus had shut himself in from so much glory; that there was no hand to clasp, no eloquent eye to meet, no voice to join with mine in the cry which rose involuntarily from my heart, ‘Blessed be Q-od for all His goodness!’ Without these tastes of paradise—which surely such a day, such skies, bring—some of us anxious ones, almost weary of life’s battle, might neAer have courage to fight on. Around mo waved a growth of tender grass j above, the bees hummed drowsily at their harvest among the blossoms, whose delicate petals ever and anon came showering down like a storm of snowflakes ; through the air the song of wren and robin carolled in melody. Far away, through an opening in the trees, I caught glimpses of Arcadian hills with their contented flocks and herds feeding quietly or reposing peacefully in the soft sunshine, which fell like a veil of golden mist over all.

Poor Mark! How all our thoughts turn upon the hinge of that secret joy or sorrow which lies concealed within us! I loved Mark now as well as in the days that I wedded him, but I did not honour him as I did then. Alas, that I should have grown to say it! —to find out how unstable he vras. Who so noble as Marcus Kerrison P who so stable, energetic, persevering as he—-or as he seemed—when he came a-courting at my father’s little rustic vicarage ! 1 You won’t object to me because I am in a‘ shipping house, will you, sir ?/ ho said to my father in his ingenuous way. ‘ I gain five hundred a-year now, and I daresay I shall be a partner before long.’ A,nd my father shook him by the hand and said he honoured men who were in business, and led useful lives. So we married, And in less than a year Mark had thrown up his good post, and taken to painting ! Pour years had rolled by since then ; and Mark was twenty-nine years of age and I six-and-twenty. The two little ones, frail us those blossoms falling in the orchard, had been taken from us early, one after the other. Perhaps it was as well. Nevertheless ray tears still fell fast for them. Mark was one of those unfortunate beings who, possessing the soul of a true artist, are yet denied the power which makes an artist successful. Ho thought he was a genius. Ho thought that if ho painted pictures, lie should become rich and famous. When his mind became unsettled, be grew to hate the routine of the office, the plodding industry of his daily life, do ho threw’it all up one unlucky day, and set up a si udio. Murk worshipped the beautiful in nature and art, and his brain was ever teeming with grand and glorious conception; ; but when lie sought to give them life, and form, and coloring, he so failed that often the object of his labor for weeks, perhaps months, was destroyed in a desp&rata, moment of shame, mprtiuptytion, and self-derision. His easel rarely held a finished picture, though it was never empty of one in some stage of advancement, exquisite in design but imperfect in execution. Hia table was strewn with sketches, beautiful and full of promise, but, like the pictures, incomplete. Ho had even made some attempts at statuary, but in this also he failed to shadow forth the visions of glory that shone in his soul. Still Mark had a good, noble, generous heart, If he had not been led away by this ignis-fatuus—this idea that he was made to be great and famous ! Meanwhile we must live: arid our house had been given up, and its contents sold piecemeal, as we wanted money. < Never mind, Helen,’ ho would say ; ‘I shall have bags of gold some time.’ Wo lived now in a tiny cottage near to Henry Raymond’s, who was the second partner in the shipping house.

It was wearing towards the close of that blessed afternoon in May, when I rose to go home, strengthened and comforted by my sweet communion with God, and rejoicing in the fresh manifestations I had witnessed of His infinite goodness and greatness. I saw nothing of Mark when I entered: ho was still in his room. I set about preparing our evening meal—-a labour quickly accomplished, for there was little to prepare. Tea and bread-and butter do not take long—but 1 made ft potato salad for Mark. How poor we had got jo be ! Mark bad no income now but his exuberant, voiceless fancies ; no prospects but the ruin of magnificent dreams ; and these were airy things to live upem. Putting the vase of flowers upon the table as Mark loved to see them, I went up to call him. lie was seated before an unfinished painting of that scene in the temple, described by St.

John, where the woman charged with sih is brought before the Master for judgment and condemnation. The drooping head, and penitent, deprecating attitude of the Magdalen, and the frightened, baffled face of her last accuser retreating slowly from the temple, were perfect in themselves, but the figure of Jesus, lifting himself up to inquire of the woman for those who had arranged her, was faintly delineated, and the artist’s inspiration seemed to have failed when most needed. I often thought it a pity Mark choee these ambitious subjects ; he might have succeeded better in simple ones. But it made him cross to say so. ‘ Shall you be able to do this, Mark ?’ 1 No,’ he frankly answered. ‘ I cannot purtray the infinite mercy, tenderness, and compassion of that countenance—but I see it in my mind. It is of no use to drop your lip, Helen.’ And so, after another day or two of struggling work—and failure, the picture, doomed to incompleteness, was thrust ignominiously aside, as so many others were thrust; and some fresh canvas appeared upon the easel.

These days—when a fresh painting was begun—were joyful days to Mark. This new subject was yet more ambitious than the other, and doomed, I knew, to earlier failure. It put me out of spirits ; the wonder was that he could not see it himself.

There was nothing but bread-and-butter that evening ; but Mark heeded it not. His face brightened as he sat opposite the open window, through which the glory of the fading day streamed, and he chatted gaily. I knew by the flush on his face that he had been planning some great, grand achievement, and that he was already reaping, in imagination, the fruits of labour not yet performed. When the meal was over, I seated myself at the western window, on which the rosy hues of sunset were softly stealing, aud took up the embroidery upon which I had been busy all the afternoon. It was a fresh piece —a baby’s robe to be elaborately worked. Mark frowned.

‘Always preoccupied, always at work!’ he said. * 1 might as well be this little atom creeping upon the hem of your sleeve—see, Helen, how small it is,’ taking off a small insect. ‘ I might as Wkl' be that, for all the heed you take of me and of my hopes.’ ‘Dear Mark! How fanciful you are! Why, I am thinking all the time what a delightful thing it is to have you so near. I can work faster when you talk pleasant things to me.’

‘ Work faster!’he repeated. ‘As if this world were nothing but a workshop. And bow can I talk to you when you never V; uchsafe me more than a flying glance, and when I cannot touch jour hand but you snatch it hastily away to push that bit of sharp steel through a patch of muslin.’ I laughed. ‘You do not want my hand, Mark. Stud old married people don’t care to hold each other’s hands as if they were yo\\\m lovers whispering in the moon light.’ He pulled the cambric from me. ‘Don’t, Mark,’l pleaded. ‘This is in a hurry. ’

‘What’s it for?’ ‘ The christening robe for Mra Oalthorpe’s baby.’ Mark started up in a passion. ‘ Helen! How often have I told you I would not have you lower yourself to work for people ! That upstart, vulgar Mrs Calthorpe ! Why, she’s not fit to tie your shoe strings !’ ‘ But 'she is rich, Mark. She pays liberally.’ ‘ I dop’t like you to do it, Helen. Just as if you were a common seamstress I Make me some fresh wristbands, if you must work.’

Mark quite angered me. He often did. A child would have had more sense. And yet in most matters he had plenty of it. ‘ It is that I don’t like my wife to do this, Helen. Surely we can manage without it.’ *We must have bread, Mark. We are not ethereal enough yet to live without it ’ ‘Bread! ■ Is the money all gone that Hadley paid me for that little picture ?’ * Why yes, Mark, Two thirds of it went in things you wanted paintingroom.*

‘I could not get on without them,’ reasoned Mark,

‘ Just so. But, Mark dear, we cannot get on without food—and it seems to me that I must find it.’

Mark sat pulling at his whiskers and gazing at me. I knew how much he hated these domestic details. His tone became gentle—hia eyes moist. ‘ When the picture I am contemplating is painted —which I have begun to-day-when that gets into the exhibition, and purchased, then I shall repay you for all these sacrifices, Helen.’

‘ You will never get a picture into the exhibition, Mark ’ ‘ How disc mragingly you speak ! It had not used to be so, Helen. Time was when you were interested in my plans, and chpered me on with hopeful and approving words.’

‘ Till I found you were pursuing an ignis fatnus,’ I said. ‘ Till I found you were cherishiug a yajn delusion, listening to a phantom voice in your soul, which was luting you away from all that could make your life a true and useful one. I saw with your eyes then, Mark I was sanguine as you; 1 had not learned experience. What have you accomplished in all these later years ?* He did not answer. His face was full of sadness.

‘ Oh, Mark, believe me I If in my secret heart I could acknowledge that Heaven had bestowed upon you a talent to cultivate, no words that I could speak would be too strong to encourage you, and no sacrifice that I could make, in the cause of your advancement, would bo too great. But think of the years -the preejoua legacy of time—frittered *way in jdie dreams and use less toil--, W ' U.t have you accomplished ? Has any gn r d been gained? Has anyone Ir en benefitted by your labours ? Have any great and noble thoughts been disseminated through your devotions to this same art ? upon whose shrine you are daily sacrificing yourself.’ I-till Mark did mt answer. He walked away to the window, and stood gazing out abstractedly at the fast gathering shades of twlight, ‘ Won’t you apeak to me, Mark ?’

* I have no hing to say.’ ‘Oh, Mark!' 1 cried, ‘do not bo angry with me ? Hear me this or\co, and I will never allude to the subject again if you cannot be brought to see as I do. You are mistaking a fervent love and a warm appreciation of the grand and the beautiful, for the gift and creative power and genius. Indeed that is the simple truth, Mark. I isten, I entreat you, to the dictates of reason before it be too late,’

(To be continued.)