Evenings at Donaldson Manor

M >> Maria J. McIntosh >> Evenings at Donaldson Manor

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CHAPTER III.

The morning after Mr. Arlington had commenced our Christmas
entertainments with the sketch of his friend Herbert Latimer's life, was
dark and gloomy. At least, such was its aspect abroad, where leaden
clouds covered the sky, and a cold, sleety rain fell fast; but within,
all was bright, and warm, and cheerful. Immediately after breakfast we
separated, each in search of amusement suited to his or her own tastes:
some to the music room, some to the library, and Robert Dudley and Annie
Donaldson to a game of battledore and shuttlecock in the wide hall, with
Mr. Arlington for a spectator. As the storm increased, however, all
seemed to feel the want of companionship, and without any preconcerted
plan, we found ourselves, about two hours after breakfast, again
assembled in the room in which quiet, patient Mrs. Donaldson sat,
ravelling the netting of the last evening.

"Now for Aunt Nancy's portfolio," cried Annie, as soon as conversation
began to flag.

The proposal was seconded so warmly that, as I could urge nothing
against it, the portfolio was immediately produced, and Annie, taking
possession of it, commissioned Robert Dudley to draw forth an
engraving:--"Scene, a chamber by night, a sleeping baby and a sleepy
mother, a basket of needle-work--I am sure it is needle-work--on the
floor, and a cross suspended from the wall," said Annie, describing the
engraving which she had taken from Robert.

"That cross looks promising," said Colonel Donaldson, who likes a little
romance as well as any of his daughters. "Let us have the fair lady's
history, Aunt Nancy."

"I know nothing about her," said I, with a smile at his eagerness.

"Then why, dear Aunt Nancy, did you keep the engraving?" asked Annie.

"I might answer, because of my interest in the scene it depicts--a scene
in which religion seems to shed its sanctifying influence over the
tenderest affection and the homeliest duties of our common life; but I
had another reason."

"Ah! I knew it," exclaimed Annie.

"I first saw this print in company with a very cultivated and
interesting German lady, to whose memory the sleeping baby recalled a
cradle song written by her countryman, the brave Koerner. She sang it for
me, and as the German is, I am grieved to say, a sealed book to me, she
gave me a literal translation of the words, which--"

"Which you have put into English verse, and written here at the back of
the engraving in the finest of all fine writing, and which papa will put
on his spectacles and read for us."

"No; I commission Mr. Arlington to do that," said the Colonel, "without
his spectacles."

"First," said I, "let me assure you that the original is full of a
simple, natural tenderness, which I fear, in the double process of
translating and versifying, has entirely escaped."

Mr. Arlington, taking the paper from Annie, now read,--

THE CRADLE SONG;

A FREE TRANSLATION FROM KOeRNER.

I.

Slumberer! to thy mother's breast,
So fondly folded, sweetly rest!
Within that fair and quiet world,
With downy pinions scarce unfurl'd,
Life gently passes, nor doth bring
One dream of sorrow on its wing.

II.

Pleasant our dreams in early hours,
When Mother-love our life embowers;--
Ah! Mother-love! thy tender light
Hath vanished from my sky of night,
Scarce leaving there one fading ray
To thrill me with, remember'd day.

III.

Thrice, by the smiles of fav'ring Heaven,
To man this holiest joy is given;
Thrice, circled by the arms of love,
With glowing spirit he may prove
The highest rapture heart can feel,
The noblest hopes our lives reveal.

IV.

The earliest blessings that enwreathed
His infant days, 'twas Love that breathed.
In Love's warm smile the nursling blooms,
Nor fears one shade that o'er him glooms,
While flowers unfold and waters dance
In joy, beneath his first, fresh glance.

V.

And when around the youth's bold course
Clouds gather--tempests spend their force--
When his soul darkens with his sky,
Again the Love-God hovers nigh;
And on some gentle maiden's breast
Lulls him, once more, to blissful rest.

VI.

But when his heart bends to the power
Of storm, as bends the summer flower,
'Tis Love that, as the Angel-Death
Wooes from his lips the ling'ring breath,
And gently bears his soul above,
To the bright skies--the home of Love.

"Poor Koerner!" said Mr. Arlington, as he concluded reading this song--if
indeed it may claim that name in its English dress--"I can sympathize,
as few can do, with his mournful memory of mother-love."

This was said in a tone of such genuine emotion, that I looked at him
with even more pleasure than I had hitherto done.

"Such tenderness touches us particularly when found, as in Koerner, in
union with manly and vigorous qualities--perhaps, because it is a rare
combination," said Mrs. Dudley.

"Is it rare?" I asked doubtfully. "The results of my own observation
have led me to believe that it is precisely in manly, vigorous,
independent minds that we see the fullest development of our simple,
natural, home-affections."

"You are right, Aunt Nancy," said Col. Donaldson; "it is only boys
striving to seem manly and men of boyish minds, who fail to acknowledge
with reverence and tenderness the value of a mother's love."

"So convinced am I of this," I replied, "that I would ask for no more
certain indication of a man's nobility of nature, than his manner to his
mother. I remember a striking illustration of the fidelity of such an
indication in two brothers of the name of Manning, with whom I was once
acquainted. The one was quite a _petit-maitre_--a dandy; the other, a
fine creature--large-minded and large-hearted. The first betrayed in
every look and movement, that he considered himself greatly his
mother's superior, and feared every moment that she should detract from
his dignity by some sin against the dicta of fashion; the other did
honor at once to her and to himself, by his reverent devotion to her.
They were a contrast, and a contrast which circumstances brought out
most strikingly. Ah, Mr. Arlington! I wish you could have seen them--a
sketch of them from your pencil would have been a picture indeed."

"We will take your word-painting instead," said Mr. Arlington.

"A mere description in words could not present them to you in all their
strongly marked diversity of character. To do this, I must give you a
history of their lives."

"And why not?"--and--"Oh, yes, Aunt Nancy, that is just what we want,"
was echoed from one to another. They consented to delay their
gratification till the evening, that I might have a little time to
arrange my reminiscences; and when "the hours of long uninterrupted
evening" came, and we had

"----stirr'd the fire and closed the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheeled the sofa round,"

and disposed ourselves in comfort for talking and for listening, I gave
them the relation which you will find below under the title of

THE BROTHERS;

OR, IN THE FASHION AND ABOVE THE FASHION.

"Some men are born to greatness--some achieve greatness--and some have
greatness thrust upon them." Henry Manning belonged to the second of
these three great classes. The son of a mercantile adventurer, who won
and lost a fortune by speculation, he found himself at sixteen years of
age called on to choose between the life of a Western farmer, with its
vigorous action, stirring incident and rough usage--and the life of a
clerk in one of the most noted establishments in Broadway, the great
source and centre of fashion in New-York. Mr. Morgan, the brother of
Mrs. Manning, who had been recalled from the distant West by the death
of her husband, and the embarrassments into which that event had plunged
her, had obtained the offer of the latter situation for one of his two
nephews, and would take the other with him to his prairie-home.

"I do not ask you to go with me, Matilda," he said to his sister,
"because our life is yet too wild and rough to suit a delicate woman,
reared, as you have been, in the midst of luxurious refinements. The
difficulties and privations of life in the West fall most heavily upon
woman, while she has little of that sustaining power which man's more
adventurous spirit finds in overcoming difficulty and coping with
danger. But let me have one of your boys; and by the time he has arrived
at manhood, he will be able, I doubt not, to offer you in his home all
the comforts, if not all the elegances of your present abode."

Mrs. Manning consented; and now the question was, which of her sons
should remain with her, and which should accompany Mr. Morgan. To Henry
Manning, older by two years than his brother George, the choice of
situations was submitted. He went with his uncle to the Broadway
establishment, heard the duties which would be demanded from him, the
salary which would be given, saw the grace with which the _elegants_
behind the counter displayed their silks, and satins, and velvets, to
the _elegantes_ before the counter, and the decision with which they
promulgated the decrees of fashion; and with that just sense of his own
powers, which is the accompaniment of true genius, he decided at once
that there lay his vocation. George, who had not been without difficulty
kept quiet, while his brother was forming his decision, as soon as it
was announced, sprang forward with a whoop that would have suited a
Western forest better than a New-York drawing-room, threw the Horace he
was reading across the table, clasped first his mother and then his
uncle in his arms, and exclaimed, "I am the boy for the West. I will
help you fell forests and build cities there, uncle. Why should not we
build cities as well as Romulus and Remus?"

"I will supply your cities with all their silks, and satins, and
velvets, and laces, and charge them nothing, George," said Henry
Manning, with that air of superiority with which the worldly-wise often
look on the sallies of the enthusiast.

"You make my head ache, my son," complained Mrs. Manning, shrinking from
his boisterous gratulation;--but Mr. Morgan returned his hearty embrace,
and as he gazed into his bold, bright face, with an eye as bright as his
own, replied to his burst of enthusiasm, "You _are_ the very boy for the
West, George. It is out of such brave stuff that pioneers and
city-builders are always made."

Henry Manning soon bowed himself into the favor of the ladies who formed
the principal customers of his employer. By his careful and really
correct habits, and his elegant taste in the selection and arrangement
of goods, he became also a favorite with his employers themselves. They
needed an agent for the selection of goods abroad, and they sent him. He
purchased cloths for them in England, and silks in France, and came home
with the reputation of a travelled man. Having persuaded his mother to
advance a capital for him by selling out the bank stock in which Mr.
Morgan had founded her little fortune, at twenty-four years of age he
commenced business for himself as a French importer. Leaving a partner
to attend to the sales at home, he went abroad for the selection of
goods, and the further enhancement of his social reputation. He returned
in two years with a fashionable figure, a most _recherche_ style of
dress, moustachios of the most approved cut, and whiskers of faultless
curl--a finished gentleman in his own conceit. With such attractions,
the _prestige_ which he derived from his reported travels and long
residence abroad, and the _savoir faire_ of one who had made the
conventional arrangements of society his study, he quickly arose to the
summit of his wishes, to the point which it had been his life's ambition
to attain. He became the umpire of taste, and his word was received as
the fiat of fashion. He continued to reside with his mother, and paid
great attention to her style of dress, and the arrangements of her
house, for it was important that his mother should appear properly. Poor
Mrs. Manning! she sometimes thought that proud title dearly purchased by
listening to his daily criticisms on appearance, language, manners,
which had been esteemed stylish enough in their day.

George Manning had visited his mother only once since he left her with
all the bright imaginings and boundless confidence of fourteen, and then
Henry was in Europe. It was during the first winter after his return,
and when the brothers had been separated for nearly twelve years, that
Mrs. Manning informed him she had received a letter from George,
announcing his intention to be in New-York in December, and to remain
with them through most if not all of the winter. Henry Manning was
evidently annoyed at the announcement.

"I wish," he said, "that George had chosen to make his visit in the
summer, when most of the people to whom I should hesitate to introduce
him would have been absent. I should be sorry to hurt his feelings, but
really, to introduce a Western farmer into polished society--" Henry
Manning shuddered, and was silent. "And then to choose this winter of
all winters for his visit, and to come in December, just at the very
time that I heard yesterday Miss Harcourt was coming from Washington to
spend a few weeks with her friend, Mrs. Duffield!"

"And what has Miss Harcourt's visit to Mrs. Duffield to do with George's
visit to us?" asked Mrs. Manning.

"A great deal--at least it has a great deal to do with my regret that he
should come just now. I told you how I became acquainted with Emma
Harcourt in Europe, and what a splendid creature she is. Even in Paris,
she bore the palm for wit and beauty--and fashion too--that is in
English and American society. But I did not tell you that she received
me with such distinguished favor, and evinced so much pretty
consciousness at my attentions, that had not her father, having been
chosen one of the electors of President and Vice-President, hurried from
Paris in order to be in this country in time for his vote, I should
probably have been induced to marry her. Her father is in Congress this
year, and you see, she no sooner learns that I am here, than she comes
to spend part of the winter with a friend in New-York."

Henry arose at this, walked to a glass, surveyed his elegant figure, and
continuing to cast occasional glances at it as he walked backwards and
forwards through the room, resumed the conversation, or rather his own
communication.

"All this is very encouraging, doubtless; but Emma Harcourt is so
perfectly elegant, so thoroughly refined, that I dread the effect upon
her of any _outre_ association--by the by, mother, if I obtain her
permission to introduce you to her, you will not wear that brown hat in
visiting her--a brown hat is my aversion--it is positively vulgar--but
to return to George--how can I introduce him, with his rough,
boisterous, Western manner, to this courtly lady?--the very thought
chills me"--and Henry Manning shivered--"and yet, how can I avoid it, if
we should be engaged?"

With December came the beautiful Emma Harcourt, and Mrs. Duffield's
house was thronged with her admirers. Hers was the form and movement of
the Huntress Queen rather than of one trained in the halls of fashion.
There was a joyous freedom in her air, her step, her glance, which, had
she been less beautiful, less talented, less fortunate in social
position or in wealth, would have placed her under the ban of fashion;
but, as it was, she commanded fashion, and even Henry Manning, the very
slave of conventionalism, had no criticism for her. He had been among
the first to call on her, and the blush that flitted across her cheek,
the smile that played upon her lips, as he was announced, might well
have flattered one even of less vanity.

The very next day, before Henry had had time to improve these symptoms
in her favor, on returning home, at five o'clock, to his dinner, he
found a stranger in the parlor with his mother. The gentleman arose on
his entrance, and he had scarcely time to glance at the tall, manly
form, the lofty air, the commanding brow, ere he found himself clasped
in his arms, with the exclamation, "Dear Henry! how rejoiced I am to see
you again."

In George Manning the physical and intellectual man had been developed
in rare harmony. He was taller and larger every way than his brother
Henry, and the self-reliance which the latter had laboriously attained
from the mastery of all conventional rules, was his by virtue of a
courageous soul, which held itself above all rules but those prescribed
by its own high sense of the right. There was a singular contrast,
rendered yet more striking by some points of resemblance, between the
pupil of society, and the child of the forest--between the Parisian
elegance of Henry, and the proud, free grace of George. His were the
step and bearing which we have seen in an Indian chief; but thought had
left its impress on his brow, and there was in his countenance that
indescribable air of refinement which marks a polished mind. In a very
few minutes Henry became reconciled to his brother's arrival, and
satisfied with him in all respects but one--his dress. This was of the
finest cloth, but made into large, loose trowsers, and a species of
hunting-shirt, trimmed with fur, belted around the waist, and
descending to the knee, instead of the tight pantaloons and closely
fitting body coat prescribed by fashion. The little party lingered long
over the table--it was seven o'clock before they arose from it.

"Dear mother," said George Manning, "I am sorry to leave you this
evening, but I will make you rich amends to-morrow by introducing to you
the friend I am going to visit, if you will permit me. Henry, it is so
long since I was in New-York that I need some direction in finding my
way--must I turn up or down Broadway for Number--, in going from this
street?"

"Number--," exclaimed Henry in surprise; "you must be mistaken--that is
Mrs. Duffield's."

"Then I am quite right, for it is at Mrs. Duffield's that I expect to
meet my friend this evening."

With some curiosity to know what friend of George could have so
completely the _entree_ of the fashionable Mrs. Duffield's house as to
make an appointment there, Henry proposed to go with him and show him
the way. There was a momentary hesitation in George's manner before he
replied, "Very well, I shall be obliged to you."

"But--excuse me George--you are not surely going in that dress--this is
one of Mrs. Duffield's reception evenings, and, early as it is, you will
find company there."

George laughed as he replied; "They must take me as I am, Henry. We do
not receive our fashions from Paris at the West."

Henry almost repented his offer to accompany his brother; but it was too
late to withdraw, for George, unconscious of this feeling, had taken his
cloak and cap, and was awaiting his escort. As they approached Mrs.
Duffield's house, George, who had hitherto led the conversation, became
silent, or answered his brother only in monosyllables, and then not
always to the purpose. As they entered the hall, the hats and cloaks
displayed there showed that, as Henry supposed, they were not the
earliest visitors. George paused for a moment and said, "You must go in
without me, Henry. Show me to a room where there is no company," he
continued, turning to a servant--"and take this card in to Mrs.
Duffield--be sure to give it to Mrs. Duffield herself."

The servant bowed low to the commanding stranger; and Henry, almost
mechanically, obeyed his direction, muttering to himself, "Free and
easy, upon my honor." He had scarcely entered the usual reception-room
and made his bow to Mrs. Duffield, when the servant presented his
brother's card. He watched her closely, and saw a smile playing over her
lips as her eyes rested on it. She glanced anxiously at Miss Harcourt,
and crossing the room to a group in which she stood, she drew her aside.
After a few whispered words, Mrs. Duffield placed the card in Miss
Harcourt's hand. A sudden flash of joy irradiated every feature of her
beautiful face, and Henry Manning saw that, but for Mrs. Duffield's
restraining hand, she would have rushed from the room. Recalled thus to
a recollection of others, she looked around her, and her eyes met his.
In an instant, her face was covered with blushes, and she drew back with
embarrassed consciousness--almost immediately, however, she raised her
head with a proud, bright expression, and though she did not look at
Henry Manning, he felt that she was conscious of his observation, as she
passed with a composed yet joyous step from the room.

Henry Manning was awaking from a dream. It was not a very pleasant
awakening, but as his vanity rather than his heart was touched, he was
able to conceal his chagrin, and appear as interesting and agreeable as
usual. He now expected with some impatience the _denouement_ of the
comedy. An hour passed away, and Mrs. Duffield's eye began to consult
the marble clock on her mantel-piece. The chime for another half-hour
rang out; and she left the room and returned in a few minutes, leaning
on the arm of George Manning.

"Who is that?--What noble-looking man is that?" were questions Henry
Manning heard from many--from a very few only the exclamation, "How
oddly he is dressed!" Before the evening was over Henry began to feel
that he was eclipsed on his own theatre--that George, if not _in the
fashion_, was yet more _the fashion_ than he.

Following the proud, happy glance of his brother's eye, a quarter of an
hour later, Henry saw Miss Harcourt entering the room in an opposite
direction from that in which she had lately come. If this was a _ruse_ on
her part to veil the connection between their movements, it was a
fruitless caution. None who had seen her before could fail now to
observe the softened character of her beauty, and those who saw

"A thousand blushing apparitions start
Into her face"--

whenever his eyes rested on her, could scarcely doubt his influence over
her.

The next morning George Manning brought Miss Harcourt to visit his
mother; and Mrs. Manning rose greatly in her son Henry's estimation,
when he saw the affectionate deference evinced towards her by the proud
beauty.

"How strange my manner must have seemed to you sometimes!" said Miss
Harcourt to Henry one day. "I was engaged to George long before I met
you in Europe; and though I never had courage to mention him to you, I
wondered a little that you never spoke of him. I never doubted for a
moment that you were acquainted with our engagement."

"I do not even yet understand where and how you and George met."

"We met at home--my father was Governor of the Territory--State now--in
which your uncle lives: our homes were very near each other's, and so we
met almost daily while I was still a child. We have had all sorts of
adventures together; for George was a great favorite with my father, and
I was permitted to go with him anywhere. He has saved my life
twice--once at the imminent peril of his own, when with the wilfulness
of a spoiled child I would ride a horse which he told me I could not
manage. Oh! you know not half his nobleness," and tears moistened the
bright eyes of the happy girl.

Henry Manning was touched through all his conventionalism, yet the
moment after he said, "George is a fine fellow, certainly; but I wish
you could persuade him to dress a little more like other people."

"I would not if I could," exclaimed Emma Harcourt, while the blood
rushed to her temples; "fashions and all such conventional regulations
are made for those who have no innate perception of the right, the
noble, the beautiful--not for such as he--he is above fashion."

What Emma would not ask, she yet did not fail to recognize as another
proof of correct judgment, when George Manning laid aside his Western
costume and assumed one less remarkable.

Henry Manning had received a new idea--that there are those who are
above the fashion. Allied to this was another thought, which in time
found entrance to his mind, that it would be at least as profitable to
devote our energies to the acquisition of true nobility of soul, pure
and high thought and refined taste, as to the study of those
conventionalisms which are but their outer garment, and can at best only
conceal for a short time their absence.

CHAPTER IV.

The next day was brilliant. Snow had fallen during the night, and the
sun, which arose without a cloud, was reflected back from it with
dazzling brightness, while every branch and spray glittered in its
casing of ice as though it had been a huge diamond. Before we met at
breakfast, the younger members of the party had decided on a
sleigh-ride. Even Col. Donaldson _malgre_ old age and rheumatism, found
himself unable to resist the cheerful morning and their gay
solicitations, and accompanied them. Mrs. Donaldson and I were left
alone, a circumstance which did not afflict either of us. Mrs. Donaldson
was never at a loss for pleasant occupation for her hours, and Annie had
given me something to do in parting.

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