LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1654, 9 June 1879, Page 3

LITERATURE.

'TO HIS OWN DOTRCOTION. Reader, follow us into a .-.ir.AU apa> tment on ihe fifth ptory, wtu:«ic.» iu on .- of ho side streets near the Luxembourg. i. js iatiguing to mount bo many stone >ios , but we roach our destination at iait. ' 'i, wivcoi t waiting to be asmoucced, let ns -u.iu'. It is a small apartment, vO.-.ai«c»-g - f three pieces—a salon,. •. l*o-ir* ;m, i k- 'hen, and offices. 1> lie bcdro m is t-j tlu. tot o) the sal-n, the kitchen <>ppu:- sic. j. ..• -c ao-myact liitlo apartment, neatly 'u uiifihvd at d to©ll cared f r The rooms arc act «oc< small for health, and iarg-. em>r:frh I*. r the «* mfort of their two occupants hr she sarcu -no or two cabinets show an ■ ; *« ’■ ’-oganco. Books abound all over tiro .’in ; bi-.iden away here under tsbits, t irrv- iin< erect on nook shelves; but I ho most instinctive feature is an ercri 1 . ire ■vovon.ci papers, books, and writing -..-.’tUrials. c:. -be centre

Stands a largo round taVle, covered with a tapestry c’oth. I* is here* that thermerds are ecrVid- when Monsi-u’ - and Madame isceivo comprmy, otherwise they use the kitchen to dine in’ every day. As they employ no regular servant, Madame finds this much more convenient in every respect It is a neat little kitchen, wfih a table iu th middle, large enough for their wants when a’one. The rest of the apartment is re splendent with shining pots and pans, and all culinary requisites. But to return to tho saloon and its occupants. Monsieur and Madame are both in there at present Ho is seated at his escri toiro, thinking d'eoly is seems ; he holds hj : pen poised in one baud', while liis head is supported, with Us weight of thought, on tho other. M*damo is sitting by the window working They have their backs to each other. It is four o’clock in the afternoon ; a September son is lighting up the room with oblique rays, casting a cheerful glow athwart the silent couple as if charged with a daily entreaty that they should bo sociable But they heed not the message. Morning, noon, and night they spend in the close companionship of husband and wife, and yet heaven and osrth aro not farther apart 1 The relationshi.) under these circumstances is terrible, to one of them at least; and Monsieur, there, leaning his head on his hand, is meditating on it silently, acutety When he rises from his desk, which he does presently, we see him. Ho is abou‘ thirty-eight yearn old ; tall, dark, hand -ome. spectacled, and moustached. As difficult a man to understand as to live happily with, we should say ; so cold and taciturn, always burled in thought more or leas, and Madame, sitting at the winnow, makes no sign of complaint. She is accu tomed to the silence, and cares not to speak, except to ask him indifferently, as he takes his hat and fomc books, before going out, ‘ When he will return.’

‘At the usual hour,’is his laconia reply, and he leaves tho room. Her face wears no aspect of regret after he has gone ; she does not seem to mind his coldness, but continues her work with stolid indifference. She is a large woman, ten years her husband’s senior, and might pass for his mother. Although in her youth she was not ill-looking by any means, she has now but few remains] of beauty left. She is stout and elderly, and wears the matter-of-fset look suggested by a atone that, to our minds, never seems to have asked a question of any power in nature as to why it Is, where it is. It is a stone, and theie it lies without even desiring to be kicked on a little further. So it seems with Madame. She is there ; a part of her apartment She has been married to Monsieur fifteen years. Once she had been young, but that was so long ago! She has forgotten all about it, and there are no children about her to renew the recollection. She had brought Monsieur a very fair dot. He was only a poor student when she married him. Their parents had arranged the marriage, and they had acquiesced. Monsieur is now a Professor, and a great student, living wholly in his books ; Madame, in her home and her economies, like a good wi f e that she is. Tin y visit, and are visited in return. They have walked together, eaten together, dwelt together, for years in an indissoluble companionship, and yet—as we have before remarked —heaven and earth were not further apart, * Grand Dim / Insupportable!’ now exclaims one of them. It is Monsieur, who on his way down stairs allows this groan to escape him. ‘ But, ungrateful man that he is, what possible fault can he have to find with Madams, his good wife ? Does she not sew for him? His home is well cared for, his substance is not wasted Is she not virtue and respectability itself? Yes, she is all this, he must own. And yet, monDieu, how insupportable is life with her!

Fifteen years had ho borne it ; silentl} 7 , uncomp l amingly, a dead life of unsympa thetic routine with a woman against whom no one could justly bring a single charg * of neglected duty. When he was sick did she not nurse him day and night? Did she not give her money to aid in his support ? Did she not, when he was only a poor student, marry him ? And what return had he made for all this? Acceptance and resignation hitherto. But now there was an upheaval of feeling at work within him that portended a volcanic crisis. Slow, silent natures that never complain can endure intensely up to a certain point; but when the fear of necessity asserts itself in them, it bursts forth into flames that lay all aronnd in ruins. He runs down the stairs rapidly, as if anxious to gain time, and is soon in the gardens of the Luxembourg, gay at this hour with troops of children and pedestrians. Presently his eye brightens and his pace quickens as he catches sight of a young widow lady holding a little boy by the hand. The child is intreating his mother to stop, that he may watch a man who is feeding a multitude of sparrows, which he has drilled to come at his call. She yields readily, and it is while standing there among a group of lookers-on that Monsieur joins her. She greets him with a smile and a look that tell their own tale, and bring the quick color to his palo care-worn cheeks. Ah, yes, she loves him -he feels it; he knows it; and she is a widow—and free! while he is still in the grip of a bondage worse to him than death. Poor Marie, standing there with her little boy watching the sparrows, she, too, has her tragedy. With what filial obedience did she marry the wealthy old man, her parents sold her to, as soon as she left school, where she had first known Monsieur, who had been her professor. “ And now she is free. Free to love as nature and her heart dictate. It is pleasant to see Monsieur every day. She has known him for so leng ! It has been such an old affair between them - when she was a girl and he her professor. He was not indifferent to her then, she thinks, and he loves her now !” With love’s unfailing instinct, she knows he docs-and —ah—how she loves him! And why not ? She is free Selfish egotist! She forgets poor madame yonder, sitting calmly at her work by the window. W T hat avails her freedom while madame exists ?

Grand Dicul Insupportable!’ again groans Monsieur as he approaches her. A’ot even ihe j >y of seeing her can mate him forget hia chains, it renders them all the more felt. While the old man, her husband was living, he had borne the burden in silence, and the pain grow dull unnourished by her presence; life became mechanical at last ; but when the old man died his torments awoke, and the whole burden of his pain found constant outlet in that one cry of ‘ Grand Dieu\ Insupportable.’ lie remains talking to Marie for a quarter of an hour. It seems hard to recognise in this passionate voluble speaker the cold and silent man of the apartment. There he was dead ; here he is alive •with the whole force of his being. It is the absence and the presence of love in either case that has wrought the miracle. And Marie, how tender and bewitching she looks, a? she listens to him ! Fho thinks she is doing no wrong, for she call him Mm Ami, that refuge of so many wrecked hearts, who fly to the harbor of * friendship’ to shelter their love laden argosies. And to do Marie justice, she is sincere. She has no wish to wrong anyone ; her affection never steps across the threshold cf impropriety ; never for an instant, he is her old friend. She dresses up her love in the garb of friendship. and embraces it as Mon Ami. She even shows it to her confessor in that dress, and i» satisfied because ho blesses it also. Andj ho listens to her sweet Mon Ami uttered in a voice eo tender and penetrating that it maddens him. ‘ How little it would take to convert the word into one far dearer,’ he thinks. ' Adieu, Marie,’ and ho shakes her hand qui -kly, passionately, leaving her abruptly as the thought crosses him. * Mon Ami, why do you go so soon V she asks pleadingly. ‘Adieu, adieu!’ is all ho can reply, for deviis are pursuing him, as she repeats the word. For a moment he listens to their tempting suggestions. Lot us, too, mark what they are saying as they riot through his blood and brain, * Life is insupportable,’ they whisper ; ‘ why should it be so when a little—so very little—can alter everything ? Marie loves y< u. Ought you to allow her to suffer ? Were it only yourself? Have you not borne calmly and honestly the weight of the dreadful years that are gone, when the old man was her husband, and she was lost to you ? But now she is free, and although for a little she will bare up bravely, still life cannot go on from day to day without bringing to her some agony born of sad separation; why let her suffer this, when a little—Bo very little-~can save herf’

' he a vac havtfm'crcy on mo!' cries the disJ man, "glia.#■ at tie suggestions which h • st,hv« to repel ; hut thoughts once bora into jfo batt c stoutly for exigence, and ip apple fiercely with heart and brain until th- v gaio recognition, if nSt acceptance, * hi Jittle— bo very little,’ they whisper, ■no ki/firiy managed ; then Marie wordd be v nn, and if you do risk anything, yon will t cl. at least, that yon liar* earned .omd j'To.’ed yoar love by sacrificing your soul to save h r fr m a life of pain or dishonour,’ ' Dlob'el spare me,’cries the naun again, atrivin. in vain to shake off the horror left '•ii hi, mind by these seductive reasouers. P.-.S they are not to be dismissed. (lo he continued.)