India

“India!” exclaimed Mark Sutherland, rising at the head of his table, and waving high the brimming glass, while his fine dark countenance lighted up with enthusiasm. A young Ajax...

“——A villa beautiful to see; Marble-porched and cedar-chambered, Hung with silken drapery; Bossed with ornaments of silver, Interlaid with gems and gold; Filled with carvings fr...

She has halls and she has vassals, and the resonant steam eagles Follow fast on the directing of her floating dove-like hand, With a thunderous vapour trailing underneath the st...

On her cheek the autumn flush Deeply ripens; such a blush In the midst of brown was born, Like red poppies grown with corn. Round her eyes her tresses lay— Which are blackest, n...

“’Tis a proud chamber and a rich, Filled with the world’s most costly things, Of precious stones and gold; Of laces, silks, and jewelry, And all that’s bought and sold.”—_Howitt._

“On her forehead sitteth pride, Crown’d with scorn, and falcon-eyed, Yet she beneath, methinks, doth twine Silken smiles that seem divine. Can such smiles be false and cold? Wil...

“Pray Heaven for firmness thy whole soul to bend To this thy purpose—to begin, pursue, With thoughts all fixed and feelings purely kind; Strength to complete, and with delight r...

“Fair wert thou, with the light On thy blue hills and sleepy waters cast From purple skies, soft deepening into night, Yet slow as if each moment was their last Of glory waning...

Eighteen months have passed since Mark Sutherland left his home. Eighteen months of persevering study, of unsuccessful effort, and of varied wanderings, find him, at the close,...

“She loves, but ’tis not him she loves— Not him on whom she ponders, When in some dream of tenderness Her truant fancy wanders. The forms that flit her vision through Are like t...

“Imagine something purer far, More free from stain of clay, Than friendship, love or passion are, Yet human still as they. And if thy lip for love like this No mortal word can f...

For the next several days, various notes of preparation as for some joyful coming event, were sounded through the old hall. Servants, within and without the house, pursued their...

“The staring madness, when she wakes, to find That which she has loved—must love—is not that She meant to love— There is a desolation in her eye He cannot bear to look on—for it...

Rosalie’s content was undisturbed and perfect. She had not witnessed India’s fainting. She knew of it, but ascribed it, as others did, to fatigue, heat, and over-excitement. She...

It was impossible that the discordant elements of social life assembled at Ashley Hall could harmonize for an instant. Of the family party gathered around the breakfast table, t...

“She’ll go with him, in all his weal and woe; She’ll be with him in sunshine and in storm; In his afflictions, should they fall on him; In his temptations, when bad men beset hi...

The world-honoured and time-honoured bard whose lines are quoted above habitually looked beneath the mere plausible surface of possibility, and from the deep insight thereby gai...

With Miss Vivian’s uncle the difficulty was even less in obtaining his consent to the marriage with Mark Sutherland; and for the following reasons:—Colonel Ashley worshipped his...

“If any two creatures grew into one, They shall do more than the world has done; Tho’ each apart were never so weak, Yet vainly thro’ the world would you seek For the knowledge...

“Nonsense, Rose. Yes, it was _I_ whom he addressed as Judge—of course it was. Every one gets an honorary title of distinction here. I don’t know what it is given for; certainly...

All the forenoon of the next day, Mr. Garner, the landlord, was absent with his team; so that our young people were obliged to defer their removal until the afternoon; and they...

Rosalie entered the house, and shut the door behind her. It was very dark, for twilight had departed, and the moon had not yet arisen. Although the door and windows were closed,...

A night’s undisturbed repose restored Rosalie’s exhausted nervous energy. The young couple arose early in the morning to begin their first day of house, or rather _cabin_-keepin...

The next morning, after breakfast, while sitting alone in her cabin, engaged, as usual, in needlework, Rosalie received a call from her kind neighbour, Mrs. Attridge, whom she f...

“You were not meant to struggle from your youth, To skulk, and creep, and in mean pathways range; Act with stern truth, largo faith, and loving will— Up and be doing.”—_Lowell._

“How changed since last her speaking eye Glanced gladness round the glittering room, Where high-born men were proud to wait— Where beauty watched to imitate Her gentle voice and...

In the meanwhile, the object of his solicitude, Clement Sutherland, sat in a private parlour of the Planters’ Hotel, in the village of C——, _afraid to return home_, with wild th...

Mark Sutherland went on board the Victress, and almost immediately betook himself to the solitude of the forsaken hurricane deck, there to walk, and while the water breeze fanne...

“’Tis shadow’d by the tulip tree—’tis mantled by the vine; The wild plum sheds its yellow fruit from fragrant thickets nigh, And flowery prairies from the door stretch till they...

And Rosalie passed into a large, square, well-ordered kitchen, over which presided another Billy—Mrs. Attridge’s ex-servant, and now Rosalie’s maid-of-all-work. And the short hi...

“Though with my high wrongs I am struck to the quick, Yet with my nobler reason ’gainst my anger Do I take part. The better action is In patience than in vengeance.”—_Shakspeare._

“Rouse to some high and holy work of love, And thou an angel’s happiness shalt know; Shalt bless the earth while in the world above; The work, begun by thee, shall onward go In...

“Slowly she faded—day by day Her step grew feebler in our hall, And fainter at each even fall Her low voice died away; Yet on her sweet, pale lips the while Sat resignation’s ho...

“Blaspheme not thou thy sacred life, nor turn O’er joys that God hath for a reason lent, Perchance to try thy spirit and its bent, Effeminate soul and base! weakly to mourn.

And where, during all these years, was India, the once fair, though faulty “Pearl of Pearl River?” Alas! how many a ship-wrecked voyager there is upon the strands of life—still...