Chapter 4

Towards the close of a most lovely spring day--and such a lovely one, to my fancy, has never beamed from the heavens since--I carelessly plucked a cowslip from a copse side, and gave it to _Constance_. 'Twas on that beautiful evening when she told me all her heart! as, seated on a mossy bank, she dissected, with downcast eyes, every part of the flower; chives, pointal, and petal, all were displayed; though I am sure she never even thought of the class. My destiny through life I considered as fixed from that hour.--Shortly afterwards I was called, by the death of a relative, to a distant part of England; upon my return, _Constance_ was no more. The army was not my original destination; but my mind began to be enfeebled by hourly musing upon one subject alone, without cessation or available termination; yet reason enough remained to convince me, that, without change and excitement, it would degenerate into fatuity.

The preparation and voyage to India, new companions, and ever-changing scenes, hushed my feelings, and produced a calm that might be called a state of blessedness--a condition in which the ignoble and inferior ingredients of our nature were subdued by the divinity of mind. Years rolled on in almost constant service; nor do I remember many of the events of that time, even with interest or regret. In one advance of the army to which I was attached, we had some skirmishing with the irregulars of our foe; the pursuit was rapid, and I fell behind my detachment, wounded and weary, in ascending a ghaut, resting in the jungle, with languid eyes fixed on the ground, without any particular feeling but that of fatigue, and the smarting of my shoulder. A _cowslip_ caught my sight! my blood rushed to my heart--and, shuddering, I started on my feet, felt no fatigue, knew of no wound, and joined my party. I had not seen this flower for ten years! but it probably saved my life--an European officer, wounded and alone, might have tempted the avarice of some of the numerous and savage followers of an Indian army. In the cooler and calmer hours of reflection since, I have often thought that this appearance was a mere phantom, an illusion--the offspring of weakness: I saw it but for a moment, and too imperfectly to be assured of reality; and whatever I believed at the time seems now to have been a painting on the mind rather than an object of vision; but how that image started up. I conjecture not--the effect was immediate and preservative. This flower was again seen in Spain: I had the command of an advance party, and in one of the recesses of the Pyrenees, of the romantic, beautiful Pyrenees, upon a secluded bank, surrounded by a shrubbery so lovely as to be noticed by many--was a _cowslip_. It was now nearly twenty years since I had seen it in Mysore: I did not start; but a cold and melancholy chill came over me; yet I might possibly have gazed long on this humble little flower, and recalled many dormant thoughts, had not a sense of duty (for we momentarily expected an attack) summoned my attentions to the realities of life: so, drawing the back of my hand across my eyes, I cheered my party with, "Forward, lads," and pursued my route, and saw it no more, until England and all her flowery meadows met my view; but many days and service had wasted life, and worn the fine edge of sensibility away; they were now before me in endless profusion, almost unheeded, and without excitement; I viewed not the cowslip, when fifty, as I had done with the eyes of nineteen.

* * * * *

THE CHRISTMAS BOX.

This is the happiest _title_ in the whole list of annuals. There is nothing sentimental or lachrymose in it; but it is warm and seasonable, and done up in a holly-green binding, it is all over old Christmas.

The first story in the volume is Old Christmas; one of the gems or sweets is Garry Owen, or the Snow-Woman, by Miss Edgeworth, for it abounds with good sentiment, just such as we should wish in the hearts and mouths of our own children, as a spice for their prattle.

We pass over _L'Egotiste Corrigée_, par Madame de Labourt--pretty enough--and the Ambitious Primrose, by Miss Dagley. Then a Song, by Miss Mitford; and a Story of Old Times, by Mrs. Hofland; and the Tragical History of Major Brown, a capital piece of fun; and Pretty Bobby, one of Miss Mitford's delightful sketches. The Visit to the Zoological Gardens is not just what we expected; still it is attractive. Major Beamish has accommodated military tactics to the nursery in a pleasant little sketch; and the proverb of Much Coin Much Care, by Mrs. R.S. Jameson is a little farce for the same stage.

But the Cuts--the pictures--of which it would have been more _juvenile_ to have spoken first. These are from the pencil of our "right trustye" friend and excellent artist, Mr. W.H. Brooke, whose horses, coaches, and dogs excite so much mirth among the young friends of the MIRROR--for, in truth, Mr. Brooke is an A.M.--an _associate_ of the MIRROR, and enables us to jump from Whitehall to Constantine's Arch at Rome, shake _hands_ with the Bears of the Zoological Society, and Peg in the Ring at Abury.

The _Christmas Box cuts_ are all fun and frolic--the tail-piece of the preface, a bricklayer on a ladder, "spilling" a hod of bricks--the Lord of Misrule, with his polichinel army--the Boar's Head--a little squat Cook and a steaming Plum-Pudding--the Bee and Honeysuckle--Major Brown with a Munchausen face--the Bear Pit, Monkeys' Houses, and Horned Owl, in the Zoological Gardens--and the Parliament of Animals, with the Elephant as Chancellor, the Tortoise for "the table," and Monkeys for Counsel--the groups of Toy Soldiers--and the head pieces of the Cobbler and his Wife--all excellent. Then the Cricket and Friar, and a pair of Dancing Crickets--worth all the fairy figures of the Smirkes, and a hundred others into the bargain. These are the little quips of the pencil that curl up our eye-lashes and dimple our faces more than all the Vatican gallery. They are trifles--aye, "trifles light as air"--but their influence convinces us that trifling is part of the great business of life.

Now we are trifling our readers' time; so to recommend the _Christmas Box_ for 1829, as one of the prettiest presents, and as much better suited to children than was its predecessor--and--pass we off.

* * * * *

Here our motley-minded sheet finishes, and we leave our readers in possession of its sweet fancies. Its little compartments of poetry and prose remind us of mosaic work, and its sentimentalities have all the varieties of the kaleidoscope. To gladden the eye, study the taste, and improve the heart, of each reader has been our aim--feelings which we hope pervade this and every other Number of the MIRROR.

* * * * *

Number 340 of the MIRROR contains the Notices of the Literary Souvenir, Forget-Me-Not, Gem, and Amulet, and with the present Number forms the Spirit of the Annuals for 1829.

* * * * *

_Printed and Published by J. LIMBIRD, 143, Strand, (near Somerset-House,) London; sold by ERNEST FLEISCHER, 626, New Market, Leipsic; and by all Newsmen and Booksellers._