Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself. Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Complete by Lytton (an ebook reader TXT) 📖
- Author: Lytton
Book online «Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Complete by Lytton (an ebook reader TXT) 📖». Author Lytton
“Impossible!—she who trusted, who trusts—who so loves—she whose whole youth hath been consumed in patient faith in me!—Resign her! and for another! I cannot—I cannot. Take from me the throne!—Oh vain heart of man, that so long desired its own curse!—Crown the Atheling; my manhood shall defend his youth.—But not this offering! No, no—I will not!”
It were tedious to relate the rest of that prolonged and agitatated conference. All that night, till the last stars waned, and the bells of prime were heard from church and convent, did the priest and the brother alternately plead and remonstrate, chide and soothe; and still Harold’s heart clung to Edith’s, with its bleeding roots. At length they, perhaps not unwisely, left him to himself; and as, whispering low their hopes and their fears of the result of the self-conflict, they went forth from the convent, Haco joined them in the courtyard, and while his cold mournful eye scanned the faces of priest and brother, he asked them “how they had sped?”
Alred shook his head and answered:
“Man’s heart is more strong in the flesh than true to the spirit.”
“Pardon me, father,” said Haco, “if I suggest that your most eloquent and persuasive ally in this, were Edith herself. Start not so incredulously; it is because she loves the Earl more than her own life, that—once show her that the Earl’s safety, greatness, honour, duty, lie in release from his troth to her—that nought save his erring love resists your counsels and his country’s claims—and Edith’s voice will have more power than yours.”
The virtuous prelate, more acquainted with man’s selfishness than woman’s devotion, only replied by an impatient gesture. But Gurth, lately wedded to a woman worthy of him, said gravely:
“Haco speaks well, my father; and methinks it is due to both that Edith should not, unconsulted, be abandoned by him for whom she has abjured all others; to whom she has been as devoted in heart as if sworn wife already. Leave we awhile my brother, never the slave of passion, and with whom England must at last prevail over all selfish thought; and ride we at once to tell to Edith what we have told to him; or rather—woman can best in such a case speak to woman—let us tell all to our Lady—Edward’s wife, Harold’s sister, and Edith’s holy godmother—and abide by her counsel. On the third day we shall return.”
“Go we so charged, noble Gurth,” said Haco, observing the prelate’s reluctant countenance, “and leave we our reverend father to watch over the Earl’s sharp struggle.”
“Thou speakest well, my son,” said the prelate, “and thy mission suits the young and the layman, better than the old and the priest.”
“Let us go, Haco,” said Gurth, briefly. “Deep, sore, and lasting, is the wound I inflict on the brother of my love; and my own heart bleeds in his; but he himself hath taught me to hold England as a Roman held Rome.”
CHAPTER X.
It is the nature of that happiness which we derive from our affections to be calm; its immense influence upon our outward life is not known till it is troubled or withdrawn. By placing his heart at peace, man leaves vent to his energies and passions, and permits their current to flow towards the aims and objects which interest labour or arouse ambition. Thus absorbed in the occupation without, he is lulled into a certain forgetfulness of the value of that internal repose which gives health and vigour to the faculties he employs abroad. But once mar this scarce felt, almost invisible harmony, and the discord extends to the remotest chords of our active being. Say to the busiest man whom thou seest in mart, camp, or senate, who seems to thee all intent upon his worldly schemes, “Thy home is reft from thee—thy household gods are shattered—that sweet noiseless content in the regular mechanism of the springs, which set the large wheels of thy soul into movement, is thine nevermore!”—and straightway all exertion seems robbed of its object—all aim of its alluring charm. “Othello’s occupation is gone!” With a start, that man will awaken from the sunlit visions of noontide ambition, and exclaim in his desolation anguish, “What are all the rewards to my labour now thou hast robbed me of repose? How little are all the gains wrung from strife, in a world of rivals and foes, compared to the smile whose sweetness I knew not till it was lost; and the sense of security from mortal ill which I took from the trust and sympathy of love?”
Thus was it with Harold in that bitter and terrible crisis of his fate. This rare and spiritual love, which had existed on hope which had never known fruition, had become the subtlest, the most exquisite part of his being; this love, to the full and holy possession of which, every step in his career seemed to advance him, was it now to be evermore reft from his heart, his existence, at the very moment when he had deemed himself most secure of its rewards—when he most needed its consolations? Hitherto, in that love he had lived in the future—he had silenced the voice of the turbulent human passion by the whisper of the patient angel, “A little while yet, and thy bride sits beside thy throne!” Now what was that future! how joyless! how desolate! The splendour vanished from Ambition—the glow from the face of Fame—the sense of Duty remained alone to counteract the pleadings of Affection; but Duty, no longer dressed in all the gorgeous colourings it took before from glory and power—Duty stern, and harsh, and terrible, as the iron frown of a Grecian Destiny.
And thus, front to front with that Duty, he sate alone one evening, while his lips murmured, “Oh fatal voyage, oh lying truth in the hell-born prophecy! this, then, this was the wife my league with the Norman was to win to my arms!” In the streets below were heard the tramp of busy feet hurrying homeward, and the confused uproar of joyous wassail from the various resorts of entertainment crowded by careless revellers. And the tread of steps mounted the stairs without his door, and there paused;—and there was the murmur of two voices without; one the clear voice of Gurth,—one softer and more troubled. The Earl lifted his head from his bosom, and his heart beat quick at the faint and scarce heard sound of that last voice. The door opened gently, gently: a form entered, and halted on the shadow of the threshold; the door closed again by a hand from without. The Earl rose to his feet, tremulously, and the next moment Edith was at his knees; her hood thrown back, her face upturned to his, bright with unfaded beauty, serene with the grandeur of self-martyrdom.
“O Harold!” she exclaimed, “dost thou remember that in the old time I said, ‘Edith had loved thee less, if thou hadst not loved England more than Edith?’ Recall, recall those words. And deemest thou now that I, who have gazed for years into thy clear soul, and learned there to sun my woman’s heart in the light of all glories native to noblest man, deemest thou, O Harold, that I am weaker now than then, when I scarce knew what England and glory were?”
“Edith, Edith, what wouldst thou say?—What knowest thou?—Who hath told thee?—What led thee hither, to take part against thyself?”
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