Ethel Churchill/Chapter 116
CHAPTER XL.
THE END.
Farewell!
Shadows and scenes that have, for many hours,
Been my companions; I part, from ye like friends—
Dear and familiar ones—with deep sad thoughts,
And hopes, almost misgivings!
"Forgive me," said Lord Norbourne, as he led the bride into the little chapel, where, at his desire, the marriage was to take place, "if, with vain confidence in myself, I, too rashly took the happiness of others into my own keeping. Forgive me for the sake of my lost Constance, whose place to me you will fill, while this life lasts!"
Ethel could not speak, but her look was enough. Mrs. Courtenaye was not at her son's second marriage; unyielding, yet generous, she was one of those spirits to whom self-sacrifice is a relief. The faith of solitude and penance suited her mind; and she had entered one of those convents which, quiet and secluded, existed yet in England. In her eyes the sacrifice was atonement, and an offering for others. Sincere and enthusiastic in her belief, the prayers that, for years, she offered for her son's happiness, made her own.
Both Mrs. Churchill and Lord Norbourne lived to an extreme old age; the last, with a happiness around his latter days, that had never belonged to his earlier years. The loss of his youngest and most beloved child had been to him the bitterest feeling of his life; but it had worked in him for good. Sorrow had subdued, and affection had softened, his nature; his sweet child had been his good angel. Her latest prayer was fulfilled even in this world; and her father found, beside the hearth of her husband, the interest and the solace of his old age.
Lavinia Fenton's history belongs to that of her time. In spite of Miss Churchill's entreaties, she continued on the stage: and her success in Polly, of the Beggars' Opera, is well known. She ended by becoming Duchess of Bolton; one of those strange instances of mere worldly prosperity, which set all ordinary calculation at defiance.
The conclusion of Lady Mary Wortley Montague's career is, also, matter of history; one of its grave, sad lessons. Clever—beautiful—with every advantage of nature and fortune, her youth was a vain search after happiness, under the mistaken name of pleasure. I do not know a moral picture more degrading than the weakness which, for years, made her shrink from the sight of a looking-glass; nor any thing more disconsolate than her long residence, during her advanced life, in a foreign country, remote alike from the sphere of her duties and her affections. Brilliant—witty —searching into human nature, as her letters undoubtedly are, there is a fearful deficiency in all higher feeling and nobler motive; the only redeeming point—but how much, indeed, does that redeem—is her tenderness for her daughter. We owe, also, to Lady Mary the introduction of inoculation—the moral courage she displayed; the blessing conferred by her exertions may well silence the harsh judgment which suits so little with our narrow and finite intelligence.
It was just such an evening, by
"Departed summer tenderly illumined,"
as the one on which our narrative commenced, that Norbourne and Ethel stood beside the little fountain, whose scattered silver fell over the blue harebells around.
They had been married at Norbourne Park, but they mutually wished to pass the first few weeks of their wedded happiness in the place which had witnessed the commencement of their love. We can bear to look back on past suffering when in the very fulness of content. Norbourne had been leaning for some time watching the soft shadows, that, as they passed, gave each a new aspect to the landscape around, before Ethel joined him. She came down the same winding path, through the wilderness, by which Henrietta had joined them the night before she went to London.
"You look pale, dearest," said Norbourne; "these daily visits to Lady Marchmont, in her wretched state, are too much for you."
"Not so," replied Ethel: "you would not, I am sure, wish me to shrink from what I hold to be a duty, though a painful one. Poor Henrietta has no friend in the world but myself. Hopeless as her madness is, though she knows me not, my presence soothes her; and with me she is gentle as a child."
"Incurable insanity!" exclaimed Norbourne, "violent or melancholy, it is an awful visitation on one so young, so beautiful, and so gifted!"
"God grant," said Ethel, "that her sufferings in this world may be her atonement in the next. As far as human skill can say, years, long years, are before her. To us, Norbourne, she will be as a sister, is it not so?"
Her husband's only answer was to clasp still closer the hand that he held in his. "You must come with me," said he, after a few moments' silence: "you will now know why I would not let you go through the churchyard this week."
They turned into the little path that led to the church, whose Gothic windows were kindled by the setting sun. Even the dark yew trees were lighted up as if by some lustrous and spiritual presence. His wife saw that beneath the one to which they were approaching, a monument had been newly erected.
"It was his last wish," said Norbourne, "not to be buried in London."
"Ethel looked up, and read on a white marble tablet the brief inscription of—"Sacred to the Memory of Walter Maynard"
THE END.
LONDON:PRINTED BY JAMES MOYES, CASTLE STREET,
LEICESTER SQUARE.