CHAPTER XVIII.

WHEN Richard Clifton awoke from that slumber, an expression of calmness rested upon his countenance. It was plain that deep despondency was no longer pressing upon his heart. His strength slightly increased, so that, on a very mild day for the season, the brothers once more sat beneath the walnut which had shaded their sports in childhood. The direction which was given to their conversation by Richard was most gratifying to his brother. They spoke of the blessed example and pious teachings of their sainted father. Henry was astonished to find how deeply those teachings had been engraven on his brother's memory. The toils and cares of a life spent in neglect of them had not obliterated them. The interest with which he dwelt upon them led to the hope that they had now something more than a place in his memory.

"Is it not too much to believe," said Richard, in the course of their conversation, "that one whose manner of life has been so different from his"--alluding to their father--"should leave the world in peace and meet him in a better one?"

"We are to believe the declarations of Holy Writ--its promises as well as its denunciations."

"True, that is the only thing that can enable one to look into the narrow house without a shudder. How mistaken are those who suppose life is not lost, provided there is peace at its close! I have hope for the future; but I still feel that I have lost my life."

Henry's heart was too full to allow him to make any reply to his brother's declaration.

"We have passed many happy days in our youth under the shade of this tree. We shall never sit together here again."

"We may."

"I am nearer the close of my journey than you are aware. I am warned by a feeling here," laying his hand on his heart, "to regard every day as my last."

"It gives me inexpressible joy to hear you speak thus composedly respecting the trying hour."

"Brother, I should like to see Margaret Gray before I die." A smile was upon his countenance as he spoke thus, but deep earnestness in his tones.

"I will go and see her, and make known your request. She will not fail to grant it, I am sure."

"Tell her I wish to see her as Margaret Gray. Help me now to my room, when I have taken one more view of this scene, from which I do so earnestly wish I had never departed."

He gazed for some moments on the landscape which had delighted his youthful vision, and entered the dwelling with a tear in his eye and a smile upon his lips. Henry repaired at once to the lone dwelling of the widow, and made known to her his brother's request.

"I never expected to meet him again in this world. I cannot disoblige him; nor would I fail to comply with his wishes; and yet I had rather not meet him."

"He has but a few days to live. You have forgiven him; and I trust He, to whom we must all look for forgiveness, has done the same."

"If that be the case, I shall be glad to meet him. I supposed he had chosen his portion, and that it would be said of him, as of the rich man of old, 'Son, thou hast had thy good things;' and yet I could never fully believe that the child of so many prayers, the child of so faithful a father, could perish at last; though I know that to his own Master must each one stand or fall--that each one must give account of himself to God. I will go with you at once."

When Mrs. Larned entered the room in which Richard Clifton was lying upon a sofa, being too feeble to rise, he lifted up his voice and wept. He extended his hand, which was taken in silence by Mrs. Larned, who sat down by his side and wept with him.

"Margaret," said he--the word caused her to start as though a sword had pierced her--"you have come to forgive me?"

"I have nothing to forgive. It is long since I had anything laid up against any human being. I pitied you, and prayed for you; but I never had anything laid up against you."

"I have always done you the justice to think so. I knew you were incapable of cherishing unkindness towards any one, however unkindly you may have been treated. You have been happy, and I have not. Do you remember the time we last walked together by the streamlet that flows from the rock spring?"

"I do."

"I enjoyed more happiness in that walk than I have enjoyed in the possession of all my wealth."

"I should be ungrateful if I were to say that I have not been happy; though I have had many trials. I learned long ago not to look for happiness here, but to prepare for it hereafter."

"You have been what men call poor; but you have been far richer than I have been. You have had treasures of the heart. You did not marry till you had a heart which you loved as Margaret Gray was capable of loving; and you have a noble boy."

"Richard Clifton is still, in part at least, what he once was!"

"You believed me changed into stone, or a bale of goods?"

"I certainly believed you changed. I supposed that you had taught your heart to love that alone which you had made the chief object of your pursuit."

"I tried to do so. I tried to persuade myself that I had done so. I habitually used language which implied I had succeeded. I deceived others; I could not deceive myself. I felt that I was not happy, despite all my efforts to persuade myself that I was. I then tried to persuade myself that I was not less happy than others. I have been acting a part ever since I left this place. I have been unhappy, and I deserved to be unhappy."

"God makes abundant provision for the happiness of his creatures."

"For time and for eternity. I have failed to avail myself of that made for the former; I hope I shall not fail in respect to the latter. And yet what right have I, who have caused much unhappiness and so little happiness to others, to expect it hereafter?"

"None of us can enter heaven of right, but through mercy and the merits of another."

"I wish your son had come with you. I wish to see him and Susan together, and to charge them to hold the treasures of the heart in higher estimation than all other treasures. I am sure they will do so. It is a great comfort to me to know that my beloved Susan is to marry the son of Margaret Gray."

"Horace will come and see you to-morrow," said she, rising and extending her trembling hand. "I must not stay longer."

"Do not go yet."

"You are becoming exhausted."

"Read to me," pointing to the book.

She took the book and turned to a suitable portion.

"Sit where I can see your countenance, if you please."

She could not refuse his request. He gazed upon her as she read, in tones which called vividly to remembrance those of other days, a consoling portion of the Words of Him who brought life and immortality to light. She then rose, wiped away a tear, silently pressed his hand, and withdrew.

Horace called the next morning, but did not receive the expected charge. During the silence of the night, Richard Clifton had ceased to be an inhabitant of earth.

(To be continued.)

INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF AUDUBON.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "TOM OWEN, THE BEE HUNTER."

NO department of natural history presents a more pleasing view than ornithology. All the associations connected with it are beautiful and inspiring. It takes its votary into the green fields and dark forests, leads him to the mountain tops, and furnishes excitement among the quiet retreats of the sequestered valley. Upon the feathered race have been expended the richest adornments of nature. There are no precious metals, no choice gems, no rare flowers, no rainbow tints that cannot find a rival counterpart in the plumage of birds; and to this transcendent beauty are added a varied, but always attractive form, a physiognomy expressive of love, of power, of unshrinking bravery. They have also voices almost human in their tones; voices that are associated with every pleasing recollection of innocence and youth because of their sweetness--and voices that startle because of their ferocity.

The habits of birds present examples of well-regulated, of almost Christianized society. They are married, and are given _to_ marriage; they set up a comfortable establishment, which is the result of their own industry. They provide plentifully for their offspring, and educate them in the way they should go, and when they are old they never depart from it. The birds rise early to procure food, and retire with the setting sun; as husbands they are gallant, as wives loving. All that they do, or say, or look may be said to interest and form universal theme for admiration. Birds rejoice in creation. In the solitary fastnesses and eternal solitudes where the eye of man never penetrates or his mind worships, the voice of the bird is heard caroling forth praise. And what in the wide world is so hearty in its nature, or so guileless, as the singing bird? How often has its innocent voice awakened conscience in the mind of the depraved or reproved the complaining spirit! Who can hear the caroling even of the tiny wren without catching its exultant spirit? We have seen it on a Sabbath sunny morning mounted upon a bud-crowded limb of the Cherokee rose, giving out its song as if its heart and body would separate in its enthusiasm; and when you thought it had soared to its highest note, it would begin again, and pour forth a torrent of love, gratitude, praise, and prayer, commingled in such varied and soul-thrilling ecstasy that the little creature trembled and vibrated as if it were the chosen and valiant exponent of some rapturous and mighty soul. Such are birds, the intelligent and ornamental companions of man, the most prominent image among the associations and pleasing recollections of childhood, and one of the most admirable and wonderful beauties presented to his maturest mind.

Scientifically speaking, it would seem that the birds, by their familiarity, were prophets in their own country, and therefore very much without honor. The poet mentioned them in his sonnets, and everybody loved them; the gallant cock and the fierce eagle were honored as the insignia of mighty nations; but the few who examined their history and wrote of their habits were more readily satisfied with imperfect illustrations and meagre descriptions than were those who devoted their energies to exhibit the habits of animals, vipers, or fishes. It may be stated as a remarkable fact that, until recently, the ornithologist was incomparably behind his compeers in science in illustrating his department, choicest of all though it be in the varied phase of animated nature.

To Audubon is the world indebted, not only for the most magnificent work on ornithology ever produced, but also for one of the most magnificent monuments ever raised by industry and genius. Take his book, examine his drawings, read his descriptions, ponder upon his reminiscences, and then turn to the most eminent of those who have preceded him, and all instantly become tame and commonplace. It is like going from the primitive forests into the stove-heated library; it is like exchanging the moving, living, teeming bird, fluttering and flying in its native haunts, for the imperfectly preserved specimens of the museum; all is motionless, eyeless--dead.

Of the mind that has accomplished so much it is difficult to speak in exaggerated praise. It may be safely asserted that Audubon had one of the most enduring that has left any impress upon the present century. He is always clear and complete in everything he undertakes. He is profuse in his originality, and yet boldly, at times, absorbs the labor of others; yet he so entirely renovates, inspires, and makes their industry his own, that his indebtedness is unthought of by the world.

The secret of Audubon's success will be found in his close pursuit of nature; of her mysteries he has been of the truest, and therefore one of her most favored priests. No labor by him was ever withheld, no toil evaded. Turning over the pages of his works, you can trace him to the tropics, where he worships and wonders; anon, he gives the witnessed history of the solitary feathered life that inhabits those inhospitable regions where the marble blue of the eternal snow scarcely ever reflects a ray of sunshine. While you read with delight of the canvass-back duck that fell beneath his rifle in the placid waters of the Chesapeake, he is suddenly, upon another page, struggling with the gigantic albatros in the surge-lashed waters of the Californias. You read on, and become lost in the green field and gentle sloping hill; you wander beside the gently running rivulet and inland lake, and rest in the shade of honeysuckle bowers. Changing still, you are ushered into the miasmatic swamps and dark fens in which only live the blear-eyed heron and repulsive bittern; and then, lifted on the wings of imagination, you climb the embattled rocks and precipices of the Cordilleras, dividing admiration of the rising sun with the eccentric flights of the mighty vulture as he wheels downward in his greetings of the god of day. Such is Audubon, who will ever be remembered as long as mind answers in admiration and sympathy with mind. He has stamped his memory in a work, and associated his name with a family that will endure in freshness when the mightiest monuments now existing will, like the pyramids, become unmeaning heaps; for his name and immortality will ever be recalled by the fanning pinions of every feathered inhabitant of the air.

The minute history of Audubon's remarkable work, from its conception to its completion, would involve the recital of some of the most exalted and interesting traits of character ever recorded. Audubon has slightly touched upon one or two incidents of discouragement that would, of themselves, have been sufficient to dishearten a less energetic being; but the years of toil and sacrifice he endured, and the ten thousand obstacles he overcame besides those he alluded to, will never be known. The fair ladies who have, in the luxurious library, admired the feathered songsters of our continent, that so gracefully sped their way over the nature-illuminated page--who have seen so cunningly illustrated the domestic life of the house wren and the wild home of the eagle--will not be less interested if they know that to the enlightened assistance of one of their own sex is the world greatly indebted for Audubon's ornithology.

The early history of Audubon seems to be this: He grew up unconscious of his powers, save as they were displayed in a genuine love of nature; arriving at manhood's estate, he married a lady of rare accomplishments and liberal fortune. With a growing family, he desired, through active business, to increase his estate, and in a few years found himself the victim of profitless mercantile speculations, and, pecuniarily, a ruined man. At an age when others think of retiring from the active scenes of life, Audubon started, not only anew, but upon an enterprise of doubtful success, and one that demanded wealth and years of industry to accomplish. Misfortune seemed to awaken the latent fire within him, and his mind suddenly overflowed with spirit-images of the feathered race, and his then comparatively unskilled fingers grasped the pencil to give form and shape to the struggling thought--but alas! the possibility. Where was the patron to cheer the seer upon this dreary pilgrimage? Who would care for his beloved family through the long years of his unfinished venture? Let the answer be found in our imperfect story.

Many years since, we were standing at the door of a country post office, listening, with others, to the reader of the only "latest paper" that had come to hand. He delivered the news, social and political, with a loud voice, and finally, under the head of "items," struck upon something as follows: "The Emperor of Russia, on his recent trip from England homewards, took extreme pleasure in looking over Audubon's great work upon the birds of America, and, as a token of his admiration, sent the author a gold snuff-box studded with diamonds."

"What's that?" inquired an old but plain citizen. "The Emperior Roosia give Audubon a diamond snuff-box studded with gold! Well, that is a good one, and comes up to my understanding of these aristocrats. Why, I knew Audubon for years, and a lazier, good-for-nothing, little bird, double-bar'l shot-gun shooting fellow I never knew;" and, with another broadside at the want of appreciation of character displayed by the Emperor of Russia, and by royal personages generally, our well-meaning friend walked away.

This familiar allusion to Audubon, for the first time, informed me of the fact that, in the vicinity of my own home in Louisiana, had Audubon and his family resided for years; and, as I became better acquainted with his works, I could readily perceive that the rich and undulating lands of the Felicianas, their primitive forests, their magnolia groves, and ever-blooming gardens, suited well the taste and pursuits of the naturalist; for the merry descendants of many of those immortalized beauties that grace his book still, in congregated thousands, fill the air with song and flight.

From few did Audubon attract attention; there was nothing in his seeming wastefulness of time to command respect. The sportsmen with whom he was surrounded seldom "sighted" their weapons on anything less than a lordly buck, and as they saw nothing in Audubon but what appeared before their eyes, they measured their own ambition with no little sarcasm against one who "found game in the chickadee and humming-bird." But Audubon lived in a world of his own; for weeks he slept in the forest, that he might make himself acquainted with the habits of some, but for him unknown, bird. For days, he hung like a spectre upon the margin of the Dismal Swamp, until the flamingo, swan, and wild duck heeded not his familiar presence. Placing a powerful telescope under the broad, spreading tree, he drew the laborious and tiny birds, as they built their nests, within his visual grasp, and counted each stick, and twig, and moss, and hair, until the little fabric was complete. In time, he returned to his charge, and, by the same artificial means, watched and admired the growing family, saw the food that reared the young, admired the tender endearments of the married birds, and recorded the whole with the faithfulness of a Pepys, and with the pastoral sweetness of a Collins or Shenstone.

"I remember, as if it were but yesterday, Audubon's first appearance in New Orleans," said a now widely-distinguished gentleman to me; "and I shall never forget," he continued, "his industry and enthusiasm, his utter devotion to his favorite pursuit. In those days, many Indians brought game to the city to sell, and Audubon soon had these wild sons of the forest in his employ. Every farthing that the most self-sacrificing economy could save went to purchase birds; and it was a picturesque sight to see the then unknown naturalist surrounded by his wild confederates, who, by the gratification of their natural habits, brought him many of the rich-plumaged aquatic birds that first formed subjects of his pencil. At this time, the courtly language of the Tuileries was his familiar tongue; and although, with the heartfelt approbation of the literary world, Audubon has placed himself among the most pleasing and original of the 'prose writers of America,' yet his first written descriptions were in a language foreign to that identical with his fame, and many of these earliest and most happy essays were so complete, that the finished student easily rendered them into our common language, and, without effort, retained that freshness and beauty that have since distinguished the English compositions of Audubon himself."

"In everything," said another of Audubon's most observing friends, "did Audubon follow nature. If he shot a duck, the grasses and the weeds among which it was found formed the accessories of his drawing. If he brought an eagle down from his eyrie, the very deadened limb that last bore the impress of his talons was secured at any sacrifice, and the bird reappeared just as he first attracted the eye of the naturalist. This care extended to the humblest of the feathered tribe; the apple-tree blossom, the thorn, the ripe fruit, the gigantic caterpillar, the variegated spider, the interlaced horse-hair, the soft down, the fragrant woodbine, myrtle, and jasmine, the honeysuckle and sweet pea, and a thousand other hints of rural life crowd in profusion the drawings of his birds, until they appear complete pictures, stories perfectly told."

Audubon, in jotting down his thoughts, has sometimes gone beyond the office of ornithologist, and given us glimpses of life in the backwoods that many have deemed exaggerations. Respectable authorities in other matters have cautioned too ready credence to these strange tales, and denied the truth of them, because not in the circle of his favorite pursuit. Let these skeptics come to Louisiana and visit, as we have done, among those who now remember his habits, and they will admit that Audubon, by his solitary journeys, his long residence in the forests, his keen eyes, and his intense industry, would unfold phases of the great book of creation unrevealed to the less studious mass of mankind.

In the hospitable mansion of W. G. J., in the parish of West Feliciana, if one will look into the parlor, they will see over the piano a cabinet-sized portrait, remarkable for a bright eye and intellectual look. The style of it is free, and there is an individuality about the whole that gives security of a strong likeness. Opposite hangs "a proof impression" of "the bird of Washington," a tribute of a grateful heart to an old friend. The first is a portrait of Audubon, painted by himself; the other is one of the first engravings that ever reached the United States of that immortal series that now make up the great work of the unsurpassed naturalist.

In the family holding these pleasing mementos, the "Audubons" lived for many years. There were evidences of this constantly occurring from day to day. It was with no ordinary interest that I examined a number of rude and unfinished drawings, rough sketches, that formed the practice that finally produced such perfection. Among the many was a charcoal likeness of a great horned owl, whose light ashy plumage and socketless eyes gave it a most ghastly appearance. Masterly as these sketches were, yet there was an evident want of that strange symmetry and correctness that mark Audubon's finished works. This I mentioned to J.

"Ah," said he, "I watched his improvement almost day by day; and how could it be otherwise with one who was so entirely devoted to his pursuits?" And then were poured forth a hundred reminiscences, alike characteristic, and in the highest degree honorable to the heads and hearts of the "family of Audubon."

And now was developed to me, until then unknown, an incident in the unwritten part of Audubon's history. Here, in the bosom of a refined family, lived for many years his accomplished wife, devoting her time to the education of her own sex. Those thus under her charge are now in the perfection of womanhood, and their superior manners and mental cultivation speak of the care and devotedness of their instructor and friend. Here it was that the wife of the great naturalist bid him go forward with his work, and not only cheered him on, but threw the acquirements of her own industry into the glory of the future. It was her example, and her voice of encouragement, and her power to help that enabled Audubon to triumph; and thus did she identify herself and her sex "with the most splendid work which art has erected to the honor of ornithology."

THE YOUNG ENTHUSIASTS.

BY FRANK I. WILSON.