Chapter 5

(How often, alas, the reformers of earth, If they studied their purpose, would find it had birth In this thirst to control; in the poor human passion The minds and the manners of others to fashion!

We sigh o'er the heathen, we weep o'er his woes, While forcing him into our creeds and our clothes. If he adds our diseases and vices as well, Still, at least we have guided him into _our_ hell And away from his own heathen hades. The pleasure Derived from that thought but reformers can measure.)

The thing Mabel Montrose loved best on this earth Was a sinner, and Roger but doubled his worth In her eyes when he wrote her that letter. And still When the last message came from Maurice Somerville And the bald, ugly facts, unsuspected, unguessed, Lay before her, the _woman_ awoke in her breast, And the patient reformer gave way to the wife, Who was torn with resentment and jealousy's strife. Ah, jealousy! vain is the effort to prove Your right in the world as the offspring of love; For oftener far, you are spawned by a heart Where Cupid has never implanted a dart. Love knows you, indeed, for you serve in his train, But crowned like a monarch you royally reign Over souls wherein love is a stranger.

No thought Came to Mabel Montrose that her own life was not Free from blame. (How few women, indeed, think of this When they grieve o'er the ruin of marital bliss!) She was shocked and indignant. Pain gave her a new Role to play without study; she missed in her cue And played badly at first, was resentful and cried Against Fate for the blow it had dealt to her pride (Though she called it her love), and declared her life blighted. It is one thing, of course, for a wife to be slighted For the average folly the world calls a sin, Such as races, clubs, games; when a woman steps in The matter assumes a new color, and Mabel, Who dearly loved sinners, at first seemed unable To pardon, or ask God to pardon, the crime Of her husband; an angry disgust for a time Drove all charity out of her heart. For a thief, For a forger, a murderer, even, her grief Had been mingled with pity and pardon; the one Thing she could not forgive was the thing he had done. It was wicked, indecent, and so unrefined. To the lure of the senses her nature was blind, And her mantle of charity never had been Wide enough to quite cover that one vulgar sin.

In the letter she sent to Maurice, though she said Little more than her thanks for his kindness, he read All her tense nervous feelings between its few lines. Though we study our words, the keen reader divines What we _thought_ while we penned them; thought odors reveal What words not infrequently seek to conceal.

Maurice read the grief, the resentment, the shame Which Mabel's heart held; to his own bosom came Stealing back, masked demurely as friendly regard, The hope of a lover--that hope long debarred. His letters grew frequent; their tone, dignified, Unselfish, and manly, appealed to her pride. Sweet sympathy mingled with praise in each line (As a gentle narcotic is stirred into wine), Soothed pain, stimulated self love, and restored her The pleasure of knowing the man still adored her.

Understand, Mabel Montrose was not a coquette, She lacked all the arts of the temptress; and yet She was young, she was feminine; love to her mind Was extreme admiration; it pleased her to find She was still, to Maurice, an ideal. A woman Must be quite unselfish, almost superhuman, And full of strong sympathy, who, in her soul, Feels no wrench when she knows she has lost all control O'er the heart of a man who once loved her.

Months passed, And Mabel accepted her burden at last And went back to her world and its duties. Her eyes, Seemed to say when she looked at you, "please sympathize, On the slight graceful form or the beautiful face. Twas a sorrow of mind, not a sorrow of heart, And the two play a wholly dissimilar part In the life of a woman.

Maurice Somerville Kept his place as good friend through sheer force of his will But his heart was in tumult; he longed for the time When, free once again from the legalized crime Of her ties, she might listen to all he would say. There was anguish, and doubt, and suspense in delay, Yet Mabel spoke never of freedom. At length He wrote her, "My will has exhausted its strength. Read the song I enclose; though my lips must be mute, The muse may at least improvise to her lute."

_Song._

There was a bird as blithe as free, (Summer and sun and song) She sang by the shores of a laughing sea, And oh, but the world seemed fair to me, And the days were sweet and long.

There was a hunter, a hunter bold, (Autumn and storm and sea) And he prisoned the bird in a cage of gold, And oh, but the world grew dark and cold, And the days were sad to me.

The hunter has gone; ah, what cares he? (Winter and wind and rain) And the caged bird pines for the air and the sea, And I long for the right to set her free To sing in the sun again.

The hunter has gone with a sneer at fate, (Spring and the sea and the sun) Let the bird fly free to find her mate, Ere the year of love grow sere and late. Sweet ladye, my song is done.

_Mabel's Letter to Maurice._

To the song of your muse I have listened. Oh, cease To think of me but as a friend, dear Maurice. Once a wife, a wife alway. I vowed from my heart, "For better, for worse, until death do us part." No mention was made in the service that day Of breaking my fetters if joy flew away. "For better, for worse," a vow lightly spoken, When Fate brings the "worse," how lightly 'tis broken!

The "worse," in my case, is the worst fate can give. Tho' I shrank from the blow, I must bear it and live, Not for self, but for duty; nor strive to evade Fulfilling the promise I willingly made. While Roger has sinned, and his sinning would be, In the eyes of the law, proof to render me free, It was God heard my vows and the Church sealed the bond. Until one of us passes to death's dim beyond, Though seas and though sins may divide us for life, We are bound to each other as husband and wife. In God's Court of Justice divorce is a word Which falls without import or meaning when heard; And the women who cast off old fetters that way, To give place to the new, on the great Judgment Day Must find, in the last summing up, that they stand Side by side, in God's eyes, with the Magdalene band. Dear Maurice, be my brother, my counselor, friend. We are lonely without you and Ruth, at Bay Bend. Come sometimes and brighten our lives; put away The thoughts which are making you restless to-day And give me your strong noble friendship; indeed 'Tis a friend that I crave, not a lover I need.

_Maurice to Mabel._

You write like a woman, and one, it is plain, Whose sentiment hangs like a cloud o'er her brain. You gaze through a sort of traditional mist, And behold a mirage of God's laws which exist But in fancy. God made but one law--it is love. A law for the earth, and the kingdoms above, A law for the woman, a law for the man, The base and the spire of His intricate plan Of existence. All evils the world ever saw Had birth in man's breaking away from this law. God cancels a marriage when love flies away. "Till death do us part" should be altered to say, "Till disgust or indifference part us." I know You never loved Roger, my heart tells me so.

He won you, I claim, through a mesmeric spell; You dreamed of an Eden, and wakened in hell. You pitied his weakness, you struggled to save him, He paid with a crime the devotion you gave him. And the blackest of insults relentlessly hurled At your poor patient heart in the gaze of the world. In God's mighty ledger the stroke of a pen Has been drawn through your record of marriage. Though men Call you wedded I hold you are widowed. Why cling To the poor, empty, meaningless form of a thing-- To the letter, devoid of all spirit? God never Intended a woman to hopelessly sever Herself from all possible joy, or to make True faithfulness suffer for faithlessness' sake. When I think of your wrongs, when I think of my woes, That black word divorce like a bright planet glows In the skies of the future. Oh, Mabel, be fair To yourself and to me. For the years of despair I have suffered you owe me some recompense, surely. The heart that has worshipped so long and so purely Ought not to be slighted for mere sentiment. We must live as our century bids us. Its bent Is away from the worn ruts of thought. Where of old The life of a woman was run in the mold Of man's wishes and passions, to-day she is free; Free to think and to act; free to do and to be What she pleases. The poor, pining victim of fate And man's cruelty, long ago went out of date. In the mansion of Life there were some things askew, Which the strong hand of Progress has righted. The new, Better plan puts old notions of sex on the shelf. Who is true to a knave, is untrue to herself. Oh, be true to yourself, and have pity on one Who has long dwelt in shadow and pines for the sun. Love, starving on memories, begs for one taste Of sweet hope, ere the remnant of youth goes to waste.

_Mabel to Maurice._

You write like a man who sees self as his goal. You speak of your woes--yet my travail of soul Seems mere sentiment to you. Maurice, pause and think Of the black, bitter potion life gave me to drink When I dreamed of love's nectar. Too fresh is the taste Of its gall on my lip for my heart in such haste To reach out for the cup that is proffered anew. A certain respect to my sorrows is due. I am weary of love as men know it. The calm Of a sweet, tranquil friendship would act like a balm On the wounds of my heart; that platonic regard, Which we read of in books, or hear sung by the bard, But so seldom can find when we want it. I thought, For a time, you had conquered mere self, and had brought Such a friendship to comfort and rest me. But no, That dream, like full many another, must go. The love that is based on attraction of sex Is a love that has brought me but sorrow. Why vex My poor soul with the same thing again? If you love With a higher emotion, you know how to prove And sustain the assertion by conduct. Maurice, Love must rise above passion, to infinite peace And serenity, ere it is love, to my mind. For the women of earth, in the ranks of mankind There are too many lovers and not enough friends. 'Tis the friend who protects, 'tis the lover who rends. He who _can_ be a friend while he _would_ be a lover Is the rarest and greatest of souls to discover. Have I found, dear Maurice, such a treasure in you? If not, I must say with this letter--adieu.

As he finished the letter there seemed but one phrase To the heart of the reader. It shone on his gaze Bright with promise and hope. "_Too fresh is the taste Of its gall on my lip for my heart in such haste To reach out for the cup that is offered anew._" "_In such haste._" Ah, how hope into certainty grew As he read and re-read that one sentence. "Let fate Take the whole thing in charge, I can wait--I can wait. I have lived through the night; though the dawn may be gray And belated, it heralds the coming of day." So he talked with himself, and grew happy at last. The five hopeless years of his sorrow were cast Like a nightmare behind him. He walked once again With a joy in his personal life, among men. There seemed to be always a smile on his lip, For he felt like a man on the deck of a ship Who has sailed through strange seas with a mutinous crew, And now in the distance sights land just in view.

The house at Bay Bend was re-opened. Once more, Where the waves of the Sound wash the New England shore, Walked Maurice; and beside him, young hope, with the tip Of his fair rosy fingers pressed hard on his lip, Urging silence. If Mabel Montrose saw the boy With the pursed prudent mouth and the eyes full of joy She said nothing. Grave, dignified (Ah, but so fair!), There was naught in her modest and womanly air To feed or encourage such hope. Yet love grew Like an air plant, with only the night and the dew To sustain it; while Mabel rejoiced in the friend, Who, in spite of himself, had come back to Bay Bend, Yielding all to her wishes. Such people, alone, Who gracefully gave up their plans for her own, Were congenial to Mabel. Though looking the sweet, Fragile creature, with feminine virtues replete, Her nature was stubborn. Beneath that fair brow Lurked an obstinate purpose to make others bow To herself in small matters. She fully believed She was right, always right; and her friends were deceived, As a rule, into thinking the same; for her eyes Held a look of such innocent grief and surprise When her will was opposed, that one felt her misused, And retired from the field of dispute, self-accused.

The days, like glad children, went hurrying out From the schoolhouse of time; months pursued the same route More sedately; a year, then two years, passed away, Yet hope, unimpaired, in the lover's heart lay, As a gem in the bed of a river might lie, Unharmed and unmoved while its waters ran by. His toil for the poor still continued, but not With that fervor of zeal which a dominant thought Lends to labor. Fair love gilded dreams filled his mind, While the corners were left for his suffering kind. He was sorry for sorrow; but love made him glad, And nothing in life now seemed hopeless or sad. His tete-a-tete visits with Mabel were rare; She ordered her life with such prudence and care Lest her white name be soiled by the gossips. And yet, Though his heart, like a steed checked too closely, would fret Sometimes at these creed-imposed fetters, he felt Keen delight in her nearness; in knowing she dwelt Within view of his high turret window. Each day Which gave him a glimpse of her, love laid away As a poem in life's precious folio. Night Held her face like a picture, dream-framed for his sight. So he fed on the crumbs from love's table, the while Fate sat looking on with a cynical smile.

IX.

SONGS FROM THE TURRET.

I.

In the day my thoughts are tender When I muse on my ladye fair. There is never one to offend her, For each is pure as a prayer. They float like spirits above her, About her and always near; And they scarce dare sigh that they love her, Because she would blush to hear.

But in dreams my thoughts grow bolder; And close to my lips of fire, I reach out my arms and enfold her, My ladye, my heart's desire. And she who, in earthly places, Seems cold as the stars above, Unmasks in those fair dream spaces And gives me love for love.

Oh day, with your thoughts of duty Cross over the sunset streams, And give me the night of beauty And love in the Land of Dreams. For there in the mystic, shady, Fair isle of the Slumber Sea, I read the heart of my ladye That here she hides from me.

II.

Some day, some beauteous day, Joy will come back again. Sorrow must fly away.

Hope, on her harp will play The old inspiring strain Some day, some beauteous day.

Through the long hours I say, "The night must fade and wane, Sorrow must fly away."

The morn's bewildering ray Shall pierce the night of rain, Some day, some beauteous day.

Autumn shall bloom like May, Delight shall spring from pain; Sorrow must fly away.

Though on my life, grief's gray Bleak shadow long hath lain, Some day, some beauteous day, Sorrow must fly away.

III.

When love is lost, the day sets toward the night. Albeit the morning sun may still be bright, And not one cloud ship sails across the sky. Yet from the places where it used to lie, Gone is the lustrous glory of the light.

No splendor rests on any mountain height, No scene spreads fair, and beauteous, to the sight. All, all seems dull and dreary to the eye, When love is lost.

Love lends to life its grandeur and its might, Love goes, and leaves behind it gloom and blight. Like ghosts of time the pallid hours drag by, And grief's one happy thought is that we die. Ah! what can recompense us for its flight, When love is lost.

IV.

Life is a ponderous lesson book, and Fate The teacher. When I came to love's fair leaf My teacher turned the page and bade me wait. "Learn first," she said, "love's grief"; And o'er and o'er through many a long to-morrow She kept me conning that sad page of sorrow.

Cruel the task; and yet it was not vain. Now the great book of life I know by heart. In that one lesson of love's loss and pain Fate doth the whole impart. For, by the depths of woe, the mind can measure The beauteous unsealed summits of love's pleasure.

Now, with the book of life upon her knee, Fate sits! the unread page of love's delight By her firm hand is half concealed from me, And half revealed to sight. Ah Fate! be kind! so well I learned love's sorrow, Give me its full delight to learn to-morrow.

V.

If I were a rain drop, and you were a leaf, I would burst from the cloud above you And lie on your breast in a rapture of rest, And love you, love you, love you.

If I were a brown bee, and you were a rose, I would fly to you, love, nor miss you; I would sip and sip from your nectared lip, And kiss you, kiss you, kiss you.

If I were a doe, dear, and you were a brook, Ah, what would I do then, think you? I would kneel by your bank, in the grasses dank, And drink you, drink you, drink you.

VI.

Time owes me such a heavy debt, How can he ever make things right? For suns that with no promise set To help me greet the morning light,

For dreams that no fruition met, For joys that passed from bud to blight, Time owes me such a heavy debt; How can he ever make things right?

For passions balked, with strain and fret Of hopes delayed, or perished quite, For kisses that I did not get On many a love impelling night, Time owes me such a heavy debt; How can he ever make things right?

VII.

As the king bird feeds on the heart of the bee, So would I feed on the sweets of thee.

As the south wind kisses the leaf at will, From the leaf of thy lips I would drink my fill.

As the sun pries into the heart of a rose, I would pry in thy heart, and its thoughts disclose.

As a dewdrop mirrors the loving sky, I would see myself in thy tear wet eye.

As the deep night shelters the day in its arms, I would hide thee, dear, from the world's alarms.

VIII.

Now do I know how Paradise doth seem, Now do I know the deep red depths of hell. Swift from those fair supernal heights I fell To burning flames of hades, in a dream. Methought my ladye rested by a stream Which rippled through the verdure of a dell. She lay like Eve; dear God, I dare not tell Of her perfections; of the glow and gleam Of tinted flesh, and undulating hair, Of sudden thigh, and sweetly rounded breast. Then, like a cloud, he came, from God knows where, And on her eyes and mouth mad kisses pressed. I fell, and fell, through leagues of scorching space, And always saw his lips upon her face.

IX.

Love is the source of all supreme delight, Love is the bitter fountain of despair; Who follows Love shall stand upon the height, Yet through the darkest depths, Love, too, leads there.

Courage needs he who would with bold Love fare, Let him set forth with all his strength bedight; Yet in his heart this song to banish care-- "Love is the source of all supreme delight."

And he must sing this song both day and night, Though he be led down shadowy pathways where Black waters moan, through valleys struck with blight, "Love is the bitter fountain of despair."

Let him be brave, and bravely let him dare Whate'er betide, and feel no coward fright. Who shares the worst, the best deserves to share; Who follows Love shall stand upon the height.

Ah! sweet is peace to those who faced the fight, And bright the crown those faithful ones shall wear, Who whispered, when the shadows veiled their sight, "Yet through the darkest depths, Love, too, leads there."

To hearts that best know Love, his dark is fair, His sorrow gladness, and his wrong is right. All joys lie waiting on his winding stair; All ways, ail paths of Love lead to the light. Love is the source.

X.

My ladye's eyes are wishing wells, Wherein I gaze with silent yearning; Deep in their depths my future dwells. My ladye's eyes are wishing wells, But not one sign my fate foretells, While my poor heart with love is burning. My ladye's eyes are wishing wells, Wherein I gaze with silent yearning.

XI.

Three things my ladye seemeth like to me-- She seems like moonlight on a waveless sea.

And like the delicate fragrance, which exhales, When Day's warm garments brush the dewy vales.

And when my heart grows weary of earth's sound, She seems like silence--restful and profound.

XII.

The moon flower, grown from a slip so slender, Has burst in a star bloom, full and white. The air is filled with a perfume tender, The breath that blows from that garden height. Yet moments lag that should take their flight On wings, like the wings of a homing dove, And the world goes wrong where it should go right, For this is a night that is lost to love.

Again, like a queen, who would rashly spend her Dower of wealth in a single night, The proud moon seems, on her track of splendor, Enriching the world with her silver light. She flings on the crest of each billow a bright Pure gem, from the casket of jewels above. But I sigh as I gaze on the glorious sight, "This is a night that is lost to love."

Oh, I would that the moon might never wend her Way through the skies in royal might, Till the haughty heart of my lady surrender And the faithful love of a life requite. For the moon was made for a lover's delight; And grayer than gloom must its luster prove To the soul that sighs under sorrow's blight, "This is a night that is lost to love."

_L'Envoi._

Fate, have pity upon my plight, And the heart of my lady to mercy move. For the saddest words that youth can write Are, "This is a night that is lost to love."

XIII.

As the waves of the outgoing sea Leave the rocks and the drift wood bare, When your thoughts are for others than me, My heart is the strand of despair-- Beloved, Where bleak suns glare, And Joy, like a desolate mourner, gropes In the wrecks of broken hopes.

As the incoming waves of the sea, The rocks and the sandbar hide, When your thoughts flow back to me, My heart leaps up on the tide-- Beloved, Where my glad hopes ride With joy at the wheel, and the sun above In a glorious sky of love.

XIV.

There was a bard all in the olden time, When bards were men to whom the world gave ear, And song an art the great gods deemed sublime, Who sought to make his willful lady hear By weaving strange new melodies of rhyme, Which voiced his love, his sorrow, and his fear.

Sweetheart, my soul is heavy now with fear, Lest thou shalt frown upon me for all time. Ah! would that I had skill to weave a rhyme Worthy to win the favor of thine ear. Tho' all the world were deaf, if thou didst hear And smile, my song would seem to me sublime.