"No, it is true, light cannot dwell, with darkness. So, poor Anna Clermont, you are lost; lost beyond human power to save. Oh! if I saw one repentant sign about you; but it is in vain. I would I would fain save you yet." But the evil one had taken possession of Anna Clermont, he had made her heart his dwelling-place, and she replied in a hard decided manner, "No, no, leave me, we shall never meet again." May the Power that you slight and contemn, yet save you from perdition! Anna Clermont, farewell!" CHAPTER XII. Heu! quam miserum est ab illo lædi, de quo non possis queri. LADY Herbert had one great duty to fulfil-to sound the depth of her daughter's heart-true, she shrunk from its fulfilment, but love and duty had ever been to her one and indivisible, and the tender affection she bore her child enabled her, like the pelican, to determine to cherish her daughter's happiness even at the cost of her own life's blood. "Since our recovery from utter wretchedness we have been calmly happy here-have we not, Sarah?" said Lady Herbert to her daughter, as they sat together by the fire (that only admissible third party to a tête-à-tête,) "have we not?" It was the night previous to their departure from Lord de Montmorenci's sheltering roof. "Yes, I believe so," replied Miss Herbert, but in such a mournful tone of voice that her mother shuddered. Yet again, she said, "You believe so! that is no answer, Sarah. De Montmorenci has been such a kind host to us that he has made us feel his house to be our home. Tell me, Sarah," reiterated Lady Herbert, after a pause, seeing the latter did not reply. "Do you not think he has been very kind to us? have we lacked any thing which he could imagine would give us pleasure? has he not prevented our every wish?" Still Miss Herbert trembled inwardly, but spoke not. "Sarah, dearest, speak to me; are you not well?" "Yes, yes, I am quite well; but I cannot answer you now-I cannot answer you as I should wish to do, fully; only, I have not been happy, or shall I ever be so again. Question me no farther at this time; hereafter, perhaps, I shall summon courage to tell you all, but not now,—I cannot." 66 Sarah, mine own dear Sarah, you have never had a secret from your mother, why not let me share your every thought-your every sorrow; remove it, if it be possible, or lighten its burden by participation!" No, mamma, I cannot tell you my unhappy secret-not whilst we are under this roof." 66 'Well, Sarah, I would have no unwilling confidence, if your heart does not respond to mine. If I am to become a stranger to you, I must, from this moment, begin the hardest lesson I have yet had to learn in all my school of adversity; but I must bear on still, till death releases me. A few tears started from Lady Herbert's burning eyelids. Miss Herbert threw her arms round her mother's neck, and wept bitterly. "Sarah, dearest, it is enough; I will not press you farther-I feel you love me. Go to bed now, and try to believe that your mother loves you far more than she loves herself." When Lady Herbert was alone, she felt the whole force of her wretchedness; a vast gulf seemed placed between her and a revival of happiness. "Yes," she said, "on earth I am never destined to be happy; but the mother will not mar the child's happiness. No, she will live for her alone." Since Lady Herbert's widowhood she had inhabited the same room as her daughter, and before she retired to rest that night, she leant fondly over Sarah Herbert, whom she hoped was sleeping, while she uttered the heart's prayer of "God bless you, dearest!" and was gently retreating, when Miss Herbert cried eagerly, in that thrilling tone which was so peculiarly her own, "Mamma, mamma, I will tell you all! I will tell you why I have not been happy-why I shall never be happy again. I have long loved De Montmorenci." She paused, she gasped for breath. The mother's tenderness prevailed heroically in Lady Herbert's breast; she betrayed not her own feelings, and she replied Well, Sarah, love, why should that make you wretched. He has long been a kind friend to you to both of us." Stay, mamma, stay, do not deceive yourself! it is not as a friend, as a protector, that I loved him, or do love him; I would be his slave,-I would ransom his life at the cost of my own; but, mamma, it is all in vain. He does not love me 80. Lady Herbert's hand trembled within her child's. Her heart turned sick-sick, she thought, unto death; but Sarah would not have felt at that moment the shock of an earthquake, for she was revealing the first passion of her innocent heart. Had Sarah Herbert known the agony of mind her declaration of love caused her mother, she would never have betrayed the secret of her passion for him, but would have concealed it at the expense of her own life; but the strange fact, that her mother was her rival, plain as it was to all else beside, never entered into her fancy; and, on her mother's part, it had been long before she could persuade herself that her child could be enamoured of a man so very much older than herself;-yet so it was: love plays strange havoc, and fate, or rather Providence, had willed it so. Mabel Herbert was never to be happy; and yet, in what had she erred? As a wife, as a parent, as a Christian, she had fulfilled her duties to the letter, and in the spirit of the law. Be it remembered, this history is a story of real life. The poetical justice of a work of fiction, as far as regards this world, is not natural, at least it is seldom so; rewards and punishments are mysteriously dealt out here, and, to judge of desert by the fate it meets upon earth would be most erroneously to judge, else why do the wicked triumph every day, and why are the good cast down and trampled under foot? There is an hereafter. Now, Lady Herbert's cup of sorrow was filled to the brim; for a few moments after her daughter's avowal, she felt as though reason would forsake her, as she inwardly repeated those dreadful words, which, like those that Dante placed over the portals of his Tartarus, said, "Lasciate ogni speranza." We are rivals-mother and child are rivals. Am I, I who have loved, who do love this innocent being better than myself, am I to stand in the way between her and happiness? No, abnegation of self alone proves the strength of pure love. Sarah shall be blessed; so she mastered her feelings, and kissing her daughter, said, "He must love, he shall love you, if he does not already do so; take comfort, dearest, calm yourself, endeavour to rest, and we will talk over this matter fully to morrow." "Rest I shall never know again, mamma. I may sleep, but sleeping or waking, the deadly weight will lie upon my heart." Sarah was very young-the enemy love, had come in upon her like a flood. Her mother knew too well, that to oppose reason to passion at this moment was vain; so she only soothed her child, and tried to pray for her. At length, wearied by her own emotions, Miss Herbert dropped asleep; youth at least can sleep even when oppressed by sorrow; but to riper age that cordial is denied. Her mother continued to sit by her bedside and watched over her. Lady Herbert's feelings during that long watchful night, can only be guessed at by those who have, like her, determined to sacrifice their own warm affections to the welfare of another. True, she thought the trial to which she was doomed, was one so uncommon in the lot of humanity, that no usual probation in life could form a parallel to her suffering, or afford her an example by which she might be guided. Still, the nature of the love she felt was, in itself, her beacon-light to conduct her through her wretchedness, Lady Herbert looked back upon her past career, and with unflinching hand turned over the pages of her whole bygone existence; and she found that she had spent it in vain. Yes, she thought, my love was too idolatrous, all idols are cast down, destroyed-and this last idol must fall like the rest." "Last night we tacitly swore to be each other's; last night our secret was revealed to each; at length I was loved, even as I could love; still love, not only in degree, but in kind. Yes, Emily," Lady Herbert went on speaking to herself, and apostrophizing one as in a dream. Long years ago, you said I should make shipwreck of felicity; the prophecy is fulfilled, this last bitter ingredient in the draught of life is bitterer than all the rest. Last night, the bright illusion love again appeared to my view, as it had done in the spring-days of my youth, fool that I was. To muse on visionary joys Which ne'er have been, which never can be mine; Which bid the mind at sober truth repine. Why, in the graver hours of life's decline, Sigh for the vivid joys, to youth denied, And where the sun of bliss did scantly shine, Reason, with withering frown, such fancies must deride.' Sarah find a rival in her mother! the thing is impossible, unnatural, monstrous; this passion for me, if it does exist, cannot last-a very little while longer, and the lingering graces of personal charm will utterly pass away. We venerate, we watch over, we feel tenderness for the old; but the passion of love must begin in early youth, and walk on side by side, till it descends the hill of life; it cannot commence in the after season of existence. De Montmorenci's love could not last; he would grow weary of the chain, and I should feel that I was his bane. Ah! would that my heart was in unison with my years, it would then cost me no pang to resign him. It would have been something, it would have been much, to have enjoyed but a few, a very few years of his love; and perhaps I might have been spared, seeing the defalcation of his passion, by being taken hence ere he ceased to hold me dear. Yes, it might have been thus, but it is not. My part is to release De Montmorenci from his promise to me-my part is to leave him free to return my Sarah's affection, and after all do I not love her better than myself?" How the heart, like a hunted hare, doubles to elude its pursuers. True, the tie which existed between Lady Herbert and her daughter was of peculiar strength and power, far subpassing the usual love of filial affection; but still, a rebel feeling in the breast of the mother exclaimed, "Love, well thou knowest no partnership allows There was then but one way to end the strife for ever, to die. Oh! how she wished that wish, how deeply, how fervently! The maternal and filial friendship which bound mother and daughter together, was rare as it was beautiful. On the part of the child it had been one of perfect obedience, of entire trust, of never-failing admiration, and dearest affec |