Mary Seaham: A Novel. Volume 1 of 3 — Reading Notes

She left her home with a bounding heart, For the world was all before her; And felt it scarce a pain to part, Such sun-bright beams came o'er her.

The wedding feast was cleared away, the guests had departed, and the last joy peal with its varied chimes, and crashing cannons from the old church tower was sounding musically through the mountain valley.

Over the whole aspect of Glan Pennant was spread that air of almost desolation, ever, more or less, succeeding an event such as had, this day, been celebrated there.

The very servants, to whose festive entertainment the evening had been appropriated, whether able to carry out to the required extent the kind intentions of their employers, or reduced by the fatigue and excitement of the day to the condition of that establishment, Dickens has so ably and ludicrously described, at all events suffered not their notes of mirth to escape the precincts of their apartments. All was hushed as the sleeping beauty's palace in the superior portion of the mansion; and if not quite deserted, to one entering the house at the moment of this opening chapter, it might almost have seemed that the same spell had been cast over its inmates.

Another moment, however, and there could have been distinguished the quick opening and shutting of an upper chamber door, and soon down the staircase, a young lady, divested of all bridal costume, in every day walking attire, might be seen to glide, and passing along the oaken passage to the door of the library, enter that apartment. A profound stillness reigned therein, though the room was not devoid of living occupants.

An old gentleman had quietly yielded himself to the indulgence of an evening nap in a maroon-coloured leather chair; whilst on an opposite sofa an elderly lady had, it seemed, been overtaken by the same necessity, whilst to the murmur of the summer breeze she contemplated the satisfactory completion of the day's great event, over the large piece of worsted work, in which, as it now lay idly at her feet, a little terrier dog had made its nest.

Mary Seaham looked upon this scene and smiled to herself. Her quiet entrance had not disturbed the sleepers. It amused her perhaps for a moment to witness a placid forgetfulness, affording so strong a contrast to the eager bustle which had but so lately subsided.

But her smile, not exactly sorrowful, was gentle and subdued, harmonising entirely with the spirit of her movements, as well as with the whole character of the scene in which she seemed to play so solitary a part.

The smile, however, was soon chased by a slight sigh, and softly calling the little dog, who roused and shook itself at her summons, springing with alacrity to obey her call, she passed through the open window, and with a semblance of relief proceeded across the lawn, her spirit appearing to revive with every elastic step she took, beneath the influence of the fresh and open air.

The clock struck eight as she passed from the grounds, and skirting the village made her way through a romantic dell, where a rapid stream issued from a thick wood, turning the rustic mill situated at its base.

Slowly she ascended a precipitous hill leading to a heath-clad common. Although she had avoided the actual village, where rude attempts at wedding decorations would have greeted her on every side, and her appearance have attracted more notice than would have been agreeable to her feelings just then, she did not escape, during her route, some stray encounters; and many a curtsey, smile, and kindly word, were bestowed upon her, by the good, simple-hearted people she met. Whilst none the less did she prize this greeting, because with the congratulatory expression of their countenances, something of pitying condolence might be visible.

The poor and humble however devoid they may be of sentiment, have often readier sympathy for the natural feeling of humanity, than we are apt to give them credit, and they could compassionate the poor young lady who had acted bridesmaid to a last unmarried sister--seen that sister carried far from home--and she left behind all alone with the old people.

Perhaps their compassion might extend almost further than the real state of the case required.

It is very sad indeed to be left behind under similar circumstances. The void, the blank, at first experienced, is perhaps one of the most painful of all mental affections that can be sustained. But I think there is something almost more melancholy, in what is sooner or later sure to follow, in more or less degree according to the tone of men's minds or the circumstances of their position--namely, when the aching void begins imperceptibly to assuage, the blank to fill up, and we cease to miss, or with difficulty realize the consciousness of our bereavement; when the strong realities and intimate associations of years seem, as by one magic touch, obliterated, and we would fain recall even the haunting shadows of the past, to assure us that such things have been.

"We cannot paint to memory's eye The scene, the glance we dearest love, Unchanged themselves, in us they die, Or faint and false their shadows prove."

But Mary Seaham was not to be subjected to any of the latter contingencies. She, also was to depart on the morrow from the home of many years, and it is to contemplate scenes which for a long time she may not look upon again, that we find her hastening.

The history of Mary Seaham's present position was this: She was an orphan, and till the return of a brother from the colonies, where he had gone to examine into the state of some very important family property; she was thrown, (particularly since the event celebrated that morning) to a certain extent, alone upon the world. Even had she desired to linger in her deserted home, the privilege was denied her. Circumstances rendering it expedient that Glan Pennant should continue to be let until the final settlement of her brother's affairs, and the Great uncle and aunt who had hitherto rented the place from their nephew, and at the same time filled the office of affectionate guardians to their unmarried nieces, now in their old age, becoming desirous of being established more among their kindred and acquaintances, than in this beautiful but distant, and out of the way country.

They were shortly to leave Wales and settle in London, with an only daughter, who had lost her husband, and lately returned from India, with her children.

The offer had been kindly made to Mary, to make her home with these relations under this new arrangement; but being a stranger to her Indian cousins, together with other motives for its rejection, she declined the proffer, at least for the present, and preferred accepting an invitation to spend the rest of the summer with another cousin and his wife in ----shire, although these relations, except from early associations, which drew her towards them with interest and affection, might be said to be almost equally unknown to her; thus her future prospects, were but of a very dim and uncertain nature.

But Mary Seaham did not take this much to heart. She was not of an age or character, nor did she possess experience sufficient, to feel any great weight of depression on this score.

The melancholy she now felt was rather of the soft, tender nature from which, like the early blossom beneath the influence of the mild spring air, her soul seemed struggling forth with hope and longing towards the uncertain future.

Although now one and twenty, her life had been, in its outward course, so calm and circumscribed, within the current of home interests, and domestic affections; so gently and gradually had the home circle broken up around her, link by link falling away, till she scarcely felt the influence of the change, that it was with confiding pleasure rather than any anxious care, or restless misgiving, she contemplated an entrance upon a changed sphere of action, never doubting but that she should find love and affection, such as she had ever been accustomed to receive, in all those professing friends who now came forward with proffered assistance in her time of need.

"In every heart a home, in every home a heaven."

In the warm-hearted cousin she remembered of old, one in whom she might repose trust and confidence, as in a brother, and in his beautiful and engaging wife the truth and sympathy of a sister.

Seated, therefore, upon the heathy common, there was more of pleasant dreaminess than of regretful sadness influencing her spirit, as her eyes wandered over the prospect spread before her with the attention of one, who would fain engrave each familiar feature on her memory, and bear away therein, a true and vivid picture of their beauties.

The pretty valley we have described lay immediately at her feet, with the woods beyond, amongst which proudly rose the mansion of Plas Glyn, of which her sister, by her marriage that morning with Sir Hugh Morgan, had become the youthful mistress; and a faint peculiar smile played on Mary's countenance as she sat there in her solitary freedom, and dwelt for a moment on this feature of the landscape.

But it had passed away, when her glance turned towards the spot where stood her own more modest, but still fairer home, Glan Pennant--then upwards, where the mountain ridges towering one above the other, were now eradiated by one of those sunsets of rare magnificence, which nature seemed to have called forth on this occasion, as a farewell token of affection to her meek and loving votary.

Once, and once only, let me speak Of all that I have felt for years; You read it not upon my cheek, You dreamed not of it in my tears.

Whilst thus absorbed, a step whose sound the soft carpeting on which it trod had not permitted her to hear, approached near to where Mary Seaham sat, and a voice broke upon her reverie.

She started a little, but perceiving who was the intruder, with a smile and only a slightly heightened colour, she arose and frankly extended her hand with the gentle exclamation: "Mr. Temple!"

The person thus addressed was a man in the full vigour of his days; of tall commanding figure, whose pale and noble countenance seemed to wear less marks of worldly care than of high and chastened thought.

His temples were already partly bare, but the rest of his thick dark curly hair bespoke the strength of manhood, and his eye, full and eloquent, beamed with a spirit and enthusiasm which might have become a martyr. The black dress he wore, seemed to denote his clerical profession.

"I shall not apologize so much as I should otherwise have done, for thus abruptly disturbing you Miss Seaham;" were the words of his rich full-toned voice, "concluding as I do, that this evening, your meditations must naturally be of somewhat melancholy a nature."

"About an hour ago you would have been but too right in your conclusion, Mr. Temple;" responded the young lady. "The bustle of the day over, the dreary feeling of being 'the last left,' was stealing over me to a most insupportable degree, but since I quitted the deserted house, the influence of this lovely evening has worked most effectually on my feelings. In the open air I think this is generally the case," she added. "However, the sense of isolation and separation, may oppress one in the confinement of the house. Here, one can feel at least that the same blue sky," and Miss Seaham as she spoke lifted up her clear serene eyes to the heaven above, "over-canopies us all. I have," she continued with simple feeling, and a slight suffusion of the eye-lid: "great need for my comfort, to realise that perhaps rather vague idea, for we shall be now indeed a most scattered family. Arthur in America, Jane and Selina in India, Alice in Scotland and Aggy so soon to be in Italy."

She paused, her voice slightly faltering, as if the idea of this domestic dispersion, when thus recorded in words, had brought the truth before her with too much painful reality.

"And you, Miss Seaham," interrogated Mr. Temple, a slight tremor also perceptible in his deep clear voice, and which a kind and friendly sympathy in the young lady's sadness might naturally have occasioned, "do you really desert Glan Pennant so very soon?"

"Yes, Mr. Temple, and had I not relied upon your promise of calling this evening, I should have sent to let you know. I could not have gone without seeing you again. I leave Glan Pennant to-morrow morning. I travel part of the way with the Merediths, and some change in their arrangements make this necessary. I own that it is a relief that I am not to linger any longer here, though this speedy departure has come upon me rather suddenly."

She looked up, as her companion did not immediately reply to this intelligence, and then he inquired seriously if she still kept to her resolution of visiting her relations in ----shire.

She answered in the affirmative.

"It is a long time since your cousin, Mr. de Burgh, and I have met," he, after some little cautious consideration, remarked. "We were schoolfellows and college friends. Our lives have taken a different turn since then, and I suppose our tastes and manners of life likewise. At least I understand"--slightly hesitating--"that he has married a gay wife, and, with his large fortune, I suppose, acts up to his circumstances and position; but in days of old, I remember Louis de Burgh to have been a man of quieter tastes and habits than his friend Edward Temple."

"I have seen nothing of my cousin since his marriage, nor of his wife either. But their letters are the kindest and most affectionate, as you may suppose," she added, "by my having accepted their invitation to pay them so long a visit."

"Ah, I once knew a great deal of some members of her family," Mr. Temple continued, speaking, not so much in the way of common conversation, than as if moved by some under current of deep and serious interest. "And you think," he added, "that you shall find your cousin's house agreeable?"

There was something dubious in his tone of voice, as he uttered that last enquiry, and Miss Seaham smiled.

"You think perhaps I shall find it too gay to suit my quiet fancy," she said, again raising her eyes to her companion's face.

He looked down upon her, and after a short pause answered with simple earnestness.

"I only think that we shall miss you sadly here."

Miss Seaham shook her head.

"I fear not, Mr. Temple," she said ingenuously; "not half so much, at least, as Selina and Aggy must be missed. I am ashamed of myself, when I think how little I have done, during the last five or six years, in comparison with my more active sisters--how I have selfishly dreamt away my time, whilst they--and Aggy, my younger sister too--have been continually going about doing good. Truly like Wordsworth's old Mathew, I have been, I am afraid,

"'An idler in the land, Contented if I might enjoy what others understand.'

No, Mr. Temple, I fear you must have found me a very incompetent disciple, and only flatter me when you talk of missing my services."

"I did not indeed speak professionally when I talked of missing you," he rejoined in a low, earnest tone, "though I by no means subscribe to your self-accusations, on the score of uselessness; besides, there are such things as moral influences," he added more seriously, with no assumption of superiority, but almost reverence in his tone and manner, "and in such, I am sure, as more than one can testify, you have not been found wanting, whilst at the same time remember, _Mary_ more than Martha found acceptance in the eyes of Him they equally desired to serve."

"Alas! alas! Mr. Temple, if you do not flatter, you make me deeply ashamed, and I fear for the first time," she added with a degree of playful reproach, "I must set you down as an unfaithful pastor--speaking false-praise, when you should be sending me away with serious exhortation and advice as to my future course of life." The colour mounted in sudden force to Mr. Temple's brow.

"Then, God forgive me my unfaithfulness if so it be!" he murmured with strong emotion, "for I do indeed confess, that never did I feel less competent to act the part of Mentor, than I do now, standing before you this evening, only trembling to be awakened from a dream I fear as futile--though not less sweet--as any day-dream which may have coloured the pure light of your existence, Miss Seaham."

She looked up. Startled by the thrilling earnestness of the speaker's voice, and still more struck by the expression of the countenance bent down upon her, Mary Seaham withdrew her gaze in some confusion the crimson blood suffusing her temples, and with averted countenance, she said, with some hurried embarrassment, whilst striving to recover from the sort of alarm her feelings had undergone, yet scarcely conscious of what she uttered.

"I am not sorry then to find that _you_ also can indulge in the weakness of a day-dream!"

But the awkward pause then followed--for Mr. Temple was silent after she made this remark and beginning to fear lest she might have offended him by its apparent lightness, she turned a timid glance towards her companion.

He was stooping down caressing the little dog by her side, not looking offended, but grave and abstracted.

She was reassured, and regarding him as thus he continued, seemingly absorbed in his own particular thoughts--his fine, strikingly handsome and intellectual countenance on which seemed to have been originally impressed the stamp of talent of a higher order, and fitted for a wider field of action than the little theatre in which they at present found employment--the feelings to which this observation gave rise, moved her to express herself in accents not devoid of gentle, admiring interest, when she said:

"Mr. Temple, do not think me impertinent, but I sometimes wonder that you should linger so long in this remote, retired spot, where all the good that it is in your power to effect is necessarily of so limited and contracted a nature. Indeed," with a blush and a smile at her own temerity, "I shall feel almost a melancholy regret in thinking of you, when I am away, hiding your talents, wasting your powers amongst the mountain heather, or on the humble inhabitants of this obscure, though lovely valley."

"'What dost thou here, frail wanderer from thy task? Why hast thou left those few sheep in the wild?'"

quoted Mr. Temple, a look of pleasure nevertheless lighting up the face which he again raised towards her.

"But a self-imposed task may not yours at present be?" persisted Miss Seaham.

He shook his head, but with the same smile continued:

"I never thought to have found _you_ my tempter; but now tell me, whither would you direct me?"

"_I_ direct you! oh, Mr. Temple, you speak ironically; but surely, there must be ways and means, by which one like you, may more effectually use your powers to the glory of God and the good of mankind, than by remaining in this secluded place, amongst people, who for the most part, do not even comprehend your language. If I understood aright, you only retired for a time, when some sorrow or trouble came upon you. I am very bold, to-night;" breaking off in some confusion, for she perceived a deep palor overspread his countenance, "but, I hope, now that there is such an excellent man as Mr. Lloyd to fulfil your voluntary duties, amongst the poor people of this dear place, you will not doom yourself longer to such--I could almost fancy it--ungenial retirement."

"Where should I go?" he sadly said, but with an earnestness which again surprised and startled Mary, whilst he fixed his eyes on her face as if on her answer his future course depended.

"Where?" she repeated with embarrassment, "you ask _me_, who know so little of the world, _you_ who know so much?"