Part 10

Wentworth Hall, where the family resided, was a large, antique, imposing structure, situated in the centre of an extensive park, and approached by a long avenue, terminating at one end in the hall door, and at the other, at the distance of almost a mile, in a massy gateway, guarded by a porter’s lodge. The house, when I first knew it, was as lordly a mansion as one would wish to see. I passed it the other day, and it was in ruins. No human being has slept within its walls since the development of the dreadful tragedy I am about to relate. God knows I shudder at the task!

I never saw a sweeter child than the young heir of Wentworth: I think now I see his little hands, his silken hair, or his soft blue eyes, so like those of his mother. All loved him. How could they help it? for in everything he resembled her who gave him birth, and she was one who insensibly won every heart, and deserved to win them too. But in nothing was this similarity so striking as in the dispositions of the mother and child. I do not believe either would knowingly have hurt a fly. Certainly no traces of the proud irascible temper of the father could be discovered in the son.

Well has it been said that the good die young. They are exhaled, as it were, like dew, back to their native sky, just at the very time when we begin fully to appreciate their worth. The young heir was scarcely three years old when his mother died. There was grief, and, I believe, heart-felt grief, up at the old hall for a while,—and then came the intelligence that Mr. Wentworth had determined to travel, and that, meanwhile, the young heir was to be left at home with a nurse, and suitable attendants.

Two years passed away. At length rumors reached the servants that their master would soon return, accompanied by a new bride. Before long these reports were confirmed, and then, after a few days’ delay, the newly wedded pair dashed up to the hall door behind a chariot and four, decorated with bride favors.

The new comer was certainly a magnificent woman, but oh! what a contrast to the sweet angel who had formerly filled her place. The first wife was rather _petite_, with soft blue eyes, and an expression of countenance almost seraphic; her successor was a tall, splendid looking woman, with dark flashing orbs, and a face whose haughty beauty was the very impersonation of a Juno. I know not why, but with all her majesty, I never liked the second Mrs. Wentworth.

In due time a son was the fruit of this marriage. The babe, like the mother, was beautiful, and it seemed to me—it may have been only fancy—that, in the rejoicings at its birth, the elder son, and undoubted heir, was totally forgotten.

It soon became evident that the new wife was paramount in her influence over her husband; but, in one thing she was foiled; she could not alienate his affections from his elder son. She dared not openly speak against the young heir, but it was evident that she hated him, because he would exclude her own child from the estate; and though the fortune of a younger son of the Wentworths would have been an independence to any one else, yet this grasping woman coveted all for her own darling. On this point, however, she knew that her husband would prove inflexible, and that his family pride would be too strong even for his wife’s persuasions. She did not, therefore, make the attempt. But in every possible way, especially when her husband was absent, she contrived to make the life of her step-son irksome and intolerable. A thousand petty vexations, such as are easier felt than described, and which no one knows so well how to inflict as a second wife, soured the early life of the young heir, and, despite his amiable disposition, made him the most unhappy of beings. The sum of his misery was filled up, when, his father having been chosen a member of Congress, left the family at Wentworth Hall, while he proceeded to Washington. From that hour, whether at his estate or at the capitol of the nation, Mr. Wentworth was so occupied by ambition that he found no time to unravel the domestic transactions of his household; so that, deprived of the check heretofore existing on her conduct in the presence of her husband, the new wife commenced a more open and oppressive series of petty persecutions on the young heir, which effectually broke the spirits of one so delicately constituted. I never saw a greater change in any one than took place in Herbert Wentworth between his fifth and eleventh years. From being used to constant exercise in the open air, he was restricted to the school-room, the library, and the garden. In a short time his health gave way, and he became pale, weakly, and melancholy. And this was the once gay and happy boy, with a heart as light as the carol of a bird! Oh! could his sainted mother have foreseen, on her death-bed, the destiny that was to overtake her child, how bitter would have been her parting hour.

Meanwhile the younger son—the darling of the mother—was indulged in every thing. His slightest wish was anticipated. He was taught every manly accomplishment of the day, and, at twelve, was already nearly as large as his delicate brother. He was a skilful horseman, and the best sportsman on the estates. But he was wilful, passionate and imperious.

So matters went on, until the young heir was nearly eighteen years of age, when his father took him to Washington with him during the session of Congress. For the first time emancipated from the thraldom of his step-mother, Herbert began to be aware of the importance of his situation, and to become more than ever averse to the tyranny of his home. He returned to Wentworth Hall an altered being. When his father, about this time, received an appointment to an embassy to one of the South American States, he solicited to accompany his parent, but the request could not be granted, and the young heir was left at home with Mrs. Wentworth and her son.

The change in the character of Herbert soon became evident to the step-mother. But, in nothing was it more perceptible than in the resistance the young heir made to the restraints attempted to be imposed on him, but from which his brother was exempt. Privileges which Herbert felt were his, equally with his brother, or to which he, if either, had the better right, were no longer surrendered without expostulation, or in some cases without a struggle. One of the great causes of difference arose from the determination, expressed by the young heir, to shoot on the estate—a privilege no rational being would have dreamed he was not entitled to—but which, his pampered brother, habituated to seeing himself indulged, and Herbert restrained, in everything, took on himself one day, in a fit of passion, to dispute. Had Mrs. Wentworth been present, even she would have seen the folly of her son and would have checked him; but, unaccustomed to be opposed, the wilful boy, when he saw his brother with a resolution as unusual as it was irritating, determined to insist on the right, flew into a rage, and, in a moment of phrenzy, presented his gun at Herbert. A scuffle ensued, in which the piece went off, whether accidentally or not was never known, and the young heir fell to the ground weltering in his blood. His life, for some time, was despaired of, during which time the brother maintained a sullen silence—but at length Herbert was declared out of danger, and, in a few weeks more, was completely restored. During this time the mother did not hesitate to give that version of the story which would, by throwing all the blame on Herbert, exculpate her darling, so that, when the young heir left his sick chamber, he found that, except among a few who knew his disposition better, he was received as an arrogant, and quarrelsome young man.

This incident, however, had exercised a powerful influence on Mrs. Wentworth. The very fact that Herbert, whom she and her son had so long ruled with a rod of iron, should attempt to break loose from the thraldom, inflamed her almost to madness. From envying, she began to hate the young heir, and that too with a deadliness of which one would have thought her incapable. And every day, as Herbert broke some new mesh of the net in which she had involved him, she learned to hate him more passionately than before. Indeed, to a woman of her disposition, nothing could be more galling than to see one, over whom she had been used to tyrannize at her pleasure, asserting his rights, even, in some cases, in direct contradiction to her commands, as, for instance, when Herbert refused, as heir to the estate, to allow some wood to be cut down which she had ordered to be felled and sold. I solemnly believe that the haughty step-mother never forgave this act—that the remembrance of it haunted her night and day—and that it filled up the cup of hatred, which before was well nigh full, and led to the dreadful catastrophe which ensued.

I have said the young heir recovered from his wound, but he remained in an exceedingly delicate state of health, so that the least exposure of his person was sure to bring on a cold, attended with pains in his side, at the seat of the wound. However, by clothing carefully according to the weather, he succeeded, in the course of some six months, in firmly, as he thought, re-establishing his health, though, it is my firm conviction, that, from the hour of his wound, his constitution was effectually undermined. Certain it is, that when Herbert, thinking himself perfectly restored, ventured one day on a little more exposure than usual, he was seized with a violent cold, which soon resulted in a fever of the most desperate character. So fatal were the ravages of the disease that his life was soon despaired of, and for several days we hourly expected to hear of his death.

During this crisis, what were the feelings of the haughty step-mother? She could not be expected to wish for the recovery of the being whom she hated with such intensity, and, although she was forced to appear concerned for him, and the best medical attendance was, by her orders, procured, yet I have not the least doubt that the one burning wish of her heart, during all that terrible time, was that the young heir might never recover. His death, indeed, would be the consummation of all her hopes. It would, at once, place her darling son in possession of the vast estates of his father—a position at which she could not look without a momentary bewilderment. As day after day elapsed, and the young heir grew weaker and weaker, her hopes rose in proportion, and the prize on which, at first, she had scarcely ventured to look, she now regarded as almost in the possession of her child. How her heart leaped—we will not attempt to disguise it—at the prospect before her. She would be removed from all fear of the interference of Herbert—she would be saved from the shame of being thwarted as she had been—she would no longer have a right to remain at the Hall only as long as her husband lived; and though, under other circumstances, she felt she might have continued in it to her dying day, yet she knew that Herbert, after what had passed, would, on his father’s death, cut off all communication with her. Besides her pride revolted from accepting a favor at the hands of the young heir. Her own child too! brought up as he had been, with habits of such lavish expenditure, how would he ever be able to live on the fortune, handsome though it was, reserved for the younger son of the house of Wentworth. He had been used to every indulgence; he had been taught to regard everybody and everything as subservient to his wishes; in short, he had been educated as the heir rather than as the younger son of the family—and now, when the vast estates of his father were almost within his grasp, when only the life of a sickly boy was in his way, could his mother be expected to look on the death of the real heir with any thing but complacency? But she dissembled her feelings: the world gave her credit for the most poignant anguish of mind during the vacillations of the disease.

“And how is the patient to-night, doctor,” said she, following the physician out of the sick chamber, and affecting to place her handkerchief to her eyes; “do you not think he is a little, a very little improved?”

“I do not wish, unnecessarily, to alarm you,” was the answer; “indeed, you must have seen the ravages of the disease; but so far from thinking your son”—oh! how the word grated on her feelings—“any better, I fear he cannot survive until morning. He is not naturally of a strong constitution, and this fever would have brought the stoutest man to the grave. I wonder how young Mr. Wentworth has withstood it so long.”

“Then you cannot give us any hope. Oh! cannot you let us have some, even the slightest, expectation of his recovery? Do, dear Doctor, only say a word like it.”

The physician shook his head sadly, for he had become attached to his patient, and knew nothing of the secret of his companion’s heart—and departed. The unnatural woman turned to her chamber, and, with a joy we will not attempt to picture, paced up and down the room. At length, she thought her wishes were about to be fulfilled; her boy, her darling boy, would inherit the broad lands she saw from her casement; and she!—she paused, and muttered—“ah! there will be a vast difference betwixt the mere widow of the proprietor of Wentworth Hall, and the mother of that personage.”

In a short time she calmed her transports, and, returning to the bed-side of the now insensible sufferer, watched there until late at night, when she retired, with apparent reluctance, leaving orders, however, to be called should any change be perceptible in the patient.

She had fallen into an uneasy sleep, in which a thousand wild dreams flitted through her mind, and the clock had just struck the second hour after her retirement, when a maid-servant knocked at her chamber door, and saying, that her young master had suddenly awoke sane, and had conversed rationally with the nurse, departed.

“He is going, then,” muttered the unnatural woman, in a delirium of joy; “they always are so just before death;” and hastily throwing on a loose dress, she hurried to the room of the sufferer.

The curtains were closed when she entered, and the nurse held up her finger, whispering—

“He has just fallen asleep. Praise to God, the crisis is past, and the dear youth will recover! His fever has left him—his skin is no longer hot—he is free from delirium.”

The words of the faithful old creature almost took away Mrs. Wentworth’s breath; she felt herself turning pale, and her brain swam around. Happily, the room was imperfectly lighted, so that the nurse could not detect the changes in the countenance of her mistress.

“_And is there any fear of a relapse?_” said Mrs. Wentworth, forcing herself to assume feelings, outwardly, far different from those really raging in her bosom. “Is the _dear boy_ safe?”

“The chances are infinitely in his favor; yet there is a possibility of a relapse. I pray God no such evil may overtake Master Herbert.”

Her mistress nodded, and feeling that she could not much longer maintain her composure, she said that she would return to her room for a moment to procure her slippers, when she would aid her in watching by the sick bed, as she was _too overjoyed to sleep_.

What pen can paint her feelings when she reached her chamber? Here were all her bright visions dissipated. The prospect before her was darker than ever. What would become of herself after her husband’s death?—what, indeed, would that husband say when he returned and heard Herbert’s version of his brother’s and her conduct? What would become of her darling son, subject, perhaps, to his father’s displeasure, and, at most, left with nothing but a younger son’s fortune, with which to support his expensive habits? She paused in the centre of her room. A thousand furies seemed agitating her countenance. Pride, fear, hate, all chased each other, by turns, through her bosom. Suddenly her face assumed a look of comparative calmness. She walked to a neighboring closet, took from its wall a small phial, and then, gazing a moment at her face in the glass, she placed her slippers on her feet, and sought the room of the invalid. Motioning to the nurse to keep her seat, this fearful woman crossed to the other side of the bed, and sat down by the little table on which stood the medicine for the sufferer. The cup already contained the dose which was to be given him at the expiration of the hour. She looked at the watch—but a few minutes remained to the time. She looked around the room—no one was in it but the nurse, who was concealed by the curtains of the bed. She hastily uncorked the phial, and, with a trembling hand, let fall a few drops of the liquid it contained into the cup. The phial was then secreted, and, with a face as ashy as the dead, she heard, the next instant, the clock strike the hour. The patient awoke at the noise, and, almost on the instant, the nurse came around and took the cup in her hand. My pen trembles so I can scarcely proceed—but I must. Suffice it to say the cup was drained, and the invalid, as if exhausted, sank back on his pillow. When next the attendant drew aside the curtain, she gazed on the face of the dead.

Let me escape from this terrible tragedy. The young heir was buried in lordly state, and no suspicion ever arose that he died otherwise than by a sudden relapse. But was Mrs. Wentworth happy? She saw her son the acknowledged heir of the estate, and for this she had labored her whole life—but was she happy? I will answer, in the words of Scripture, when speaking of the wicked—“Terrors take hold on him as waters; the tempest swalloweth him up in the night. . . . _For God shall cast upon him and not spare._”

Time passed. Even Mrs. Wentworth began to find, in the lapse of years, and in gazing on her son, now near eighteen, some alleviation for her tortured mind. But God, whose inscrutable Providence had hitherto seemed to forget the unholy deed we have just narrated, was now preparing for its author a fearful retribution.

It was just five years from the day of Herbert’s death, when the doating mother was standing in the door of her house, surrounded by a party of visitors of her own age, waiting for the approach of a gay cavalcade of young people, coming up the avenue. The sky was gloomy and threatened a storm, and the riders were evidently returning in haste. But the tempest was quicker than even their fleet steeds, and the group, with young Wentworth at its head, was yet some distance from the door, when the storm burst on the riders. Each put spurs to his horse, and the young heir, as wilful as ever, instead of awaiting his companions, dashed forward as fast as his steed—the fleetest of them all—could carry him. He was already several rods in advance of his companions, when the wind, suddenly bursting out into a hurricane, swept across the avenue, taking in its course a huge, but somewhat decayed tree, whose trunk, after swaying forwards a moment, was seen to yield to the gale just as young Wentworth came underneath it.

“Look out!” shouted those who saw the danger.

“Save him!—oh! save him!” shrieked the mother.

It was too late. Down, with a crash like thunder, came the gigantic tree, the trunk striking the unhappy youth right on the head, and bearing him to the earth as if he was a mere twig. There was a wild cry, and all that remained of the victim was one quivering hand, extended, as if in supplication, beyond the trunk of the tree.

The spectators stood aghast, transfixed with speechless horror, at the fearful sight. A deathlike stillness of a moment, and only of a moment, followed. It was broken by a long, wild, harrowing shriek of anguish, at the remembrance of which, even now, my blood runs cold. They all turned instinctively in the same direction—towards the mother of the victim—for that shriek could have come from no one else. They saw her fall like marble to the earth. They sprang to her side. Her eyes were wide open, glaring fearfully on vacancy—the foam had gathered, thick and white, on her bloodless lips—her whole frame was quivering in an agony such as—thank God!—mortal man has rarely seen. There she lay, struck by the hand of God, writhing in convulsions. Tell me not there is no retribution! Oh! fearfully was that murdered boy avenged.

They took her up, bore her into her stately chamber, and despatched messengers on every hand for medical aid. All that the skill of the profession could do to restore her was exerted, but for a long time unsuccessfully. At length, however, Mrs. Wentworth showed signs of recovery. Slowly, consciousness appeared to return to her; but just when her attendants were beginning to hope that the danger had passed, she sprang up in her bed, and, placing her hands before her eyes, shrieked, “save him—save him—oh, God! have mercy—I am the murderer—he is innocent,” and with other ejaculations, equally as terrific, she sank down on the couch, in a paroxysm of madness. _She was a maniac._ It was not many days before nature gave way beneath the struggle, but, during the ravings of her phrenzy, she recapitulated the whole of the dreadful tragedy, and in words too that made her listeners tremble to hear. It has often occurred to me, that, if the death-bed revelations of but one year could be made public, they would make us avoid our fellow-men as beings of a darker world.

One word and this melancholy leaf is ended. Mr. Wentworth never returned from his mission, but fell a victim to the climate of South America. His estate having been entailed to the issue of his own body, of course, failing such issue, passed in the regular course of succession; and descending to nearly a score of collateral heirs, who divided the property betwixt them, was soon broken into fragments. The old Hall was shunned with superstitious fear, and is now in ruins. So pass away the things of this world.

D.

* * * * *

MY BONNIE BLUE-EYED LASSIE, O!

A SCOTTISH BALLAD.

SUNG BY MR. DEMPSTER. _Philadelphia_: John F. Nunns, _184 Chesnut Street_.

I sing the bonnie E’e of her, My bonnie, bonnie Lassie O! I

sing the praise of ane I luve, My bonnie, bonnie Lassie, O! I sing of monie a time and aft, We’ve gane thegither cheerly, O! And bless the E’e that welcomes me, My bonnie blue-eyed Lassie, O!

Her face sae fair, her winning air, Sure nane is like my lassie, O! When e’r we meet, she smiles so sweet, My bonnie blue-eyed lassie, O! And monie a time at fair or green, We’ve prattled aft and dearly, O! I press’d my suit, she pleaded youth, My bonnie blue-eyed lassie, O!

Yes, woo I still, yes, woo I will, My bonnie, bonnie lassie, O! The world can ne’er ha’e charms for me, Without my blue-eyed lassie, O! When last we met, I saw her e’e Half turn’d aside so winning, O! I named the kirk, she gied consent, My ain dear blue-eyed lassie, O!

* * * * *

COTTAGE PIETY.

BY JEREMY SHORT, ESQ.

“Early had they learned To reverence the volume that displays The mystery, the life which cannot die.” _Wordsworth._