A Love Story, by a Bushman by - (classic literature books TXT) 📖

and harmonious style of Architecture,

that has yet flourished in England.

 

Its outer appearance was comparatively simple—it had neither spire,

lantern, or transepts—and its ivy-hidden belfry was a detached tower.

 

The walls of the aisles were supported by massive buttresses, and

surmounted by carved pinnacles; and from them sprung flying buttresses,

ornamented with traced machicolations, to bear the weight of the embattled

roof of the nave.

 

The interior was more striking. As the stranger entered by the western

door, and proceeded up the nave, each step was re-echoed from the crypt

below:—as he trod on strange images, and inscriptions in brass;

commemorative of the dead, whose bones were mouldering in the subterranean

chapel. On them, many coloured tints fantastically played, through

gorgeously stained panes—the workmanship of the Middle Ages.

 

The richly carved oaken confessional—now a reading desk—first attracted

the attention.

 

In the very centre of the chapel, stood a white marble font, whose chaplet

of the flower of the Tudors, encircled by a fillet, sufficiently bespoke

its date. Between the altar and this font was a tomb, which merits special

attention. It was the chantry of Sir Reginald Delmé, the chief of his

house in the reign of Harry Monmouth. It was a mimic chapel, raised on

three massive steps of grey stone. The clustered columns, that bore the

light and fretted roof, were divided by mullions, rosettes, and trefoils

in open work; except where the interstices were filled up below, to bear

the sculptured, and once emblazoned shields of the Delmés, and their

cognate families. The entrance to the chantry, was through a little turret

at its north-eastern corner, the oaken door of which, studded with

quarrel-headed nails, was at one time never opened, but when the priests

ascended the six steep and spiral steps, and stood around the tomb to

chant masses for the dead.

 

The diminutive font, and the sarcophagus itself, had once been painted. On

this, lay the figure of Sir Reginald Delmé.

 

On a stone cushion—once red—supported by figures of angels in the

attitude of prayer, veiling their eyes with their wings, reposed the

unarmed head of the warrior:—his feet uncrossed rested on the image of a

dog, crouching on a broken horn, seeming faithfully to gaze at the face of

his master.

 

The arms were not crossed—the hands were not clasped; but were joined as

in prayer. Sir Reginald had not died in battle. Above the head of the

sleeping warrior, hung his gorget, and his helmet, with its beaver, and

vizor open; and the banner he himself had won, on the field of Shrewsbury,

heavily shook its thick folds in the air. The fading colours on the

surcoat of the recumbent knight, still faintly showed the lilies and

leopards of England;—and Sir Henry himself was willing to believe, that

the jagged marks made in that banner by the tooth of Time, were but cuts,

left by the sword of the Herald, as at the royal Henry’s command, he

curtailed the pennon of the knight; and again restored it to Sir Reginald

Delmé—a banner.

 

The altar, which extended the whole width of the chapel, was enclosed by a

marble screen, and was still flanked by the hallowed niche, built to

receive the drainings of the sacred cup.

 

The aisles were divided from the nave, by lancet arches, springing from

clustered columns. But how describe the expansive windows, with their rich

mullions, and richer rosettes—their deeply moulded labels, following the

form of the arch, and resting for support on the quaintest masks—how

describe the matchless hues of the glass—valued mementoes of a bygone

age, and of an art that has perished?

 

The walls of the chapel were profusely ornamented with the richest

carving; and the oaken panels of the chancel, were adorned with those

exquisite festoons of fruit and flowers, so peculiarly English. The very

ceiling exacted admiration. It closed no lantern—it obstructed no

view—and its light ribs, springing from voluted corbels, bore at each

intersection, an emblazoned escutcheon, or painted heraldic device. The

intricate fan-like tracery of the roof—the enriched bosses at each

meeting of the gilded ribs—gave an airy charm and lightness to the whole,

which well accorded with the florid Architecture, and with the chivalrous

associations, with which it is identified.

 

And here, beneath this spangled canopy, in this ancient shrine, whose

every ornament was as a memory of her ancestors; stood Emily Delmé, as

fair as the fairest of her race, changeful and trembling, a faint smile

on her lip, and a quivering tear in her eye.

 

Clarendon Gage took her hand in his, and placed on her finger the golden

pledge of truth, and as he did so, an approving sunbeam burst through the

crimson-stained pane, and before lightening the tomb of Sir Reginald, fell

on her silvery veil—her snowy robe—her beautiful face.

 

There was a very gay scene on the lawn, as they returned from the chapel.

 

The dancing had already commenced—strains of music were heard from on

high—the ever moving circle became one moment contracted, then expanded

to the full length of the arms of the dancers, as they actively footed it

round the garlanded May-pole.

 

At the first sight of the leading carriage, however, a signal was

given—the music suddenly ceased—and the whole party below, with the

exception of one individual, proceeded in great state towards an arch,

composed of flowers and white thorn, which o’ercanopied the road.

 

The carriage stopped to greet the procession.

 

On came the blushing May-Queen, and Maid Marian—both armed with wands

wreathed with cowslips—followed by a jovial retinue of morrice dancers

with drawn swords—guisers in many-coloured ribbons—and a full train of

simple peasants, in white smock-frocks.

 

The May Queen advanced to the carriage, followed by the peasant girls, and

timidly dropped a choice wreath into the lap of the bride. Loud hurras

rung in the air, as Sir Henry gave his steward some welcome instructions

as to the village feast; and the cavalcade continued its route.

 

We have said that one individual lingered near the May-pole. As he was

especially active, we may describe him and his employment. He was

apparently about fifteen. He had coarse straight white hair—a face that

denoted stupidity—but with a cunning leer, which seemed to belie his

other features.

 

He was taking advantage of the cessation of dancing, to supply the

aspiring musicians with sundry articles of good cheer. A rope, armed with

a hook, was dropped from their lofty aërie, and promptly drawn up, on the

youngster’s obtaining from the neighbouring tents, wherewithal to fill

satisfactorily the basket which he attached.

 

Sir Henry Delmé and George had been so much abroad, and Emily’s attachment

to Clarendon was of so early a date, that it happened that the members of

the Delmé family had mixed little in the festivities of the county in

which they resided; and were not intimately known, nor perhaps fully

appreciated, in the neighbourhood.

 

But the family was one of high standing, and had ever been remarkable for

its kind-heartedness; and what was known of its individuals, was so much

to their credit, that it kept alive the respect and consideration that

these circumstances might of themselves warrant.

 

Sir Henry, on the other hand, regarded his sister’s marriage as an event,

at which it might be proper to show, that neither hauteur nor want of

sociability, had precluded their friendly intercourse with the

neighbouring magnates; and consequently, most of the principal families

were present at Emily’s wedding.

 

While this large assemblage increased the gaiety of the scene, it was

somewhat wearisome to Delmé, who was too truly attached to his sister, to

be otherwise than thoughtful during the ceremony, and the breakfast that

succeeded it.

 

At length the time came when Emily could escape from the gay throng; and

endeavour, in the quiet of her own room, to be once more calm, before she

prepared to leave her much-loved home.

 

The preparations made, a note was despatched to her brother, begging him

to meet her in the library. As he did so, a fresh pang shot through

Delmé‘s heart.

 

As he looked on Emily’s flushed face—her dewy cheek—and noted her

agitated manner; he for the first time perceived, her very strong

resemblance to poor George, and wondered that he had never observed

this before.

 

Clarendon announced the carriage.

 

“God bless you! dear Henry!”

 

“God bless and preserve you! my sweet! Clarendon! good bye! I am sure you

will take every care of her!”

 

In another moment, the carriage was whirling past the library window; and

Sir Henry felt little inclined, to join the formal party in the

drawing-room. Sending therefore a brief message to Mrs. Glenallan, he

threw open the library window, and with hurried steps reached a

summer-house, half hidden in the shrubbery. He there fell into a deep

reverie, which was by no means a pleasurable one.

 

He thought of Emily—of George—of Acmé,—and felt that he was becoming an

isolated being.

 

And had he not loved too? As this thought crossed him, his ambitious

dreams were almost forgotten.

 

Sir Henry Delmé was aroused by the sound of voices. A loving couple, too

much engaged to observe him, passed close to the summer-house.

 

It was the “Queen of the May,” the prettiest and one of the poorest

girls in the parish, walking arm in arm with her rural swain. They had

left the “roasted beeves,” and the “broached casks,” for one half-hour’s

delicious converse.

 

There was some little coquettish resistance on the part of the girl, as

they sat down together at the foot of a fir tree.

 

Her lover put his arm round her waist.

 

“Oh! Mary! if father would but give us a cow or so!”

 

This little incident decided the matter. Delmé at once resolved that Mary

Smith should have a cow or so; and also that his own health would be

greatly benefited, by a short sojourn at Leamington.

 

Chapter XV.

 

The Meeting.

 

“Oh ever loving, lovely, and beloved!

How selfish sorrow ponders on the past,

And clings to thoughts now better far removed,

But Time shall tear thy shadow from me last.”

 

We know not whether our readers have followed us with due attention, as we

have incidentally, and at various intervals, made our brief allusion to

the gradual change of character, wrought on Delmé, by the eventful scenes

in which he so lately played a prominent part.

 

When we first introduced him to our reader’s notice, we endeavoured to

depict him as he then really was,—a man of strong principles, warm

heart, and many noble qualities; but one, prone to over-estimate the

value of birth and fortune—with a large proportion of pride and

reserve—and with ideas greatly tinctured with the absurd fallacies of

the mere man of the world.

 

But there was much in the family events we have described, to shake

Delmé‘s previous convictions, and to induce him to recal many of his

former opinions.

 

He had seen his brother form a connection, which set at naught all those

convenances, which he had been accustomed to regard as essential to, and

as indeed forming the very ingredient of, domestic happiness.

 

And yet Sir Henry Delmé could not disguise from himself, that if, in

George’s short-lived career, there had been much of pain and sorrow, they

were chiefly engendered by George’s mental struggle, to uphold those very

opinions to which he himself was wedded; and that to this alone, might be

traced much of the suffering he had undergone. This was it that had so

weakened mind and body, as to render change of scene necessary;—this was

it that exposed Acmé to the air of the pestiferous marshes, and which left

George himself—a