CHAPTER X

MARY BARNES

I see her still, in her plain black dress, coming towards the castle from the landing-stage of the steamer, and crossing the quadrangle with soft, noiseless tread, as gentle and calm as the breath of the evening breeze, bringing with her an atmosphere of comfort and peace of which we became conscious even before she had crossed the threshold.

We were looking out for her with impatience and some misgivings, my brother Wilhelm and I, for the advent of a new nurse is an event of no small importance in children’s lives, and already, scarce three and four years of age as we were respectively, we had undergone the trial of parting with the dear old one who had made herself so justly beloved, and whose place was taken by a younger woman, whom we detested with equal vehemence and on equally good grounds. So we ensconced ourselves firmly in the broad window-sill to have a better view of the new-comer, wondering to ourselves which of her two predecessors she would resemble. Our doubts were dispelled even before Barnes entered the house; the quick, unerring instinct of childhood told us that many happy days were in store for us in the care of this good, kind soul, who came along as noiselessly as a leaf wafted hither by the wind. I do not think she was at all beautiful--in point of fact rather a plain-featured elderly woman, with at times a decided squint; but our eyes had quickly discerned the beauty of the soul under that homely exterior, and lovely she ever remained to us. We saw in her a sort of guardian angel, shielding us from every peril that might beset the path of childhood, watching over our health with untiring zeal, and entirely wrapped up in our happiness. For herself she seemed to ask nothing, to want nothing, to have no wishes or desires beyond those that affected the well-being of her little charges. That the motherly instinct should be so strong in her, and should, so to say, pervade her whole person, was the less surprising considering that she had, as she herself told us, from the age of ten played the part of the mother they had lost to her own younger brothers and sisters. She was the ideal nurse; scrupulous in the fulfilment of all her duties, and her honest simplicity coupled with such innate delicacy of feeling as to lend a certain refinement to her whole person. She was at her happiest as she sat, needle in hand, watching our games, and from time to time laying down her work, the more thoroughly to enter into our merriment; we might laugh and romp to our heart’s content, her calm was unruffled, her patience inexhaustible. Our childish intuition had not been at fault in foreseeing that under her kindly sway our nursery would once more become a little paradise, the dearest corner for us in the whole house. We should have asked nothing better than to be left there as long as possible; but alas! the governess was already on the way to whom I was to be handed over, and who was antipathetic to me from the very first, her cleverness availing nothing to conceal that she was both underbred and ill-tempered. I fled as often as I could from her harshness and bad manners, back to the dear old nursery--back to the good angel, Barnes! I was surely somewhat young to have been removed at all from those gentle influences, but the step had been judged a wise one by my parents, in order to turn to account as early as possible the magnificent health and excellent abilities with which I was blessed. To this young, but physically fragile couple--the valetudinarian father, pale, melancholy, of sedentary and studious habits, and the mother, whose own natural liveliness was being undermined by the attacks of an insidious and baffling malady--to them there may well have been something disconcerting and almost alarming in the temperament of such a child, the quintessence of health, restless as quicksilver and blithe as a bird, in whose young limbs the joy of living pulsed wildly and on whose lips snatches of song were forever alternating with ringing laughter! It cannot be wondered at if they only saw in my high spirits a sure sign of frivolity, and that on every occasion on which my indomitable will showed itself, I should simply have been condemned as headstrong and obstinate.

I seized, then, every possible opportunity to rush off to the nursery, to shake myself free of all fetters and restraint--to breathe freely once more! I kept up the habit for some time of going every now and then to spend a quiet hour with Barnes, helping her with her mending and sewing, for her needle was never idle, and it was so soothing to sit and talk with her. I have said how she watched over us, tending us with such admirable care that my brother’s health improved from the day she entered our house. But all that was nothing compared to the superhuman devotion, the heroic self-sacrifice of the life which began for her from the moment of poor little Otto’s birth. She it was who first discovered what was wrong with the unfortunate child, and with tenderness and loving care that are beyond all praise and which words are inadequate to describe, she gave herself up heart and soul to his service, mitigating as far as might be the terrible sufferings that made a martyrdom of his short life. Day and night she was at her post, indefatigable, uncomplaining, holding him in her arms for hours at a time to ease his pain and enable him to breathe with a little less difficulty, her whole thought how to bring some relief to the poor tortured little frame. What those tortures were, none knew so well as the faithful Barnes, and I have therefore chiefly borrowed her own simple words, when I have tried to tell the story of my poor little brother’s life. He did not live to complete his twelfth year, but in that short space of time he had suffered so unutterably and with so little respite, one could not have wished the trial to be prolonged. Hardest of all it was to his devoted nurse to leave him before the end, but even that sacrifice was demanded of her, my mother believing it to be for the boy’s good and all important for the formation of his character that he should not be left too long under feminine control. Just as she had never complained of fatigue or discomfort during all the sleepless nights and weary days in which she had watched beside him, so now this hardest trial brought no murmur to her lips. She accepted it with the same pious resignation, bravely hiding under a smiling face her own aching heart, in order to soften the pangs of separation to her beloved foster-child. Otto had always called her Nana, and Nana she remained for us, even after she had left us altogether to take charge of the nursery of the Grand Duchess of Baden, in whose service she died.

But before the end came for Otto, Barnes was sent for once more, and stayed with him some days, days unspeakably precious to both, until all was over. And again she had the courage, the supreme courage of true affection, to smile as she bade him that last farewell!

Were it not for my profound conviction, that in publishing these reminiscences, I am but extending to a larger circle of friends and sympathisers the confidence already reposed in some, I should never have the courage to throw open the sacred precincts of the Past. But the lesson of these lives may be useful thus, and bring hope and comfort to souls still fainting under their heavy burden.

Above all do I feel it a duty, when I hear so much said of the worthlessness of human nature, to tell of the good which I have witnessed and experienced. Fate has perhaps in this dealt more kindly with me than with most, for I have met far more good than evil, and have seldom been disappointed and deceived where I have bestowed affection and trust.

Can one even believe in absolute malevolence? May not those who appear animated by ill-will sometimes be simply mistaken? Surely the noble-minded Lamartine was right, when he spoke of “les pauvres méchants!” With some of them it is perhaps sheer clumsiness; they think to show their affection, but its object is crushed to death by it, as surely as the victim of a bear’s uncouth embrace!

How should those who are born with a bear’s ungainly paws, bear the branch of palm or scatter lilies throughout the world! There are a few, like our good Barnes, whose hands were made to carry lilies. Wherever she turned, balsam sprang forth. Her own life was joyless, but for the comfort it brought to others, and therein she found abiding happiness.

Barnes lies buried in the church at Meinau, and a tablet with a most touching and beautiful inscription is put up to her memory. But what is that beside the tablet on which her memory is engraved within my heart!--I still see her with her eyes riveted on Otto’s face, following every change in it with an expression of the deepest concern, and the words, “that poor child!” ever and anon breaking involuntarily from her lips. Of herself, her own sufferings, her own fatigue, never a word; it was always of _him_ she spoke, of his marvellous patience, his unexampled fortitude. Surely she must be rewarded now, in seeing him no longer writhing with pain, but radiant in health and youthful beauty, having shuffled off this mortal coil, to live on triumphant with the life of the spirit.