Jane Talbot Part 14

It has always been so. I have always found an unaccountable pleasure in dissecting, as it were, my heart; uncovering, one by one, its many folds, and laying it before you, as a country is shown in a map. This voluble tongue and this prompt, pen! what volumes have I talked to you on that bewitching theme,--myself!

And yet, loquacious as I am, I never interrupted you when you were talking. It was always such a favour when these rigid fibres of yours relaxed; and yet I praise myself for more forbearance than belongs to me.

The little impertinent has often stopped your mouth,--at times too when your talk charmed her most; but then it was not with words.

But have I not said this a score of times before? and why do I indulge this prate now?

To say truth, I am perplexed and unhappy. Your letter has made me so.

My heart flutters too much to allow me to attend to the subject of your letter. I follow this rambling leader merely to escape from more arduous paths, and I send you this scribble because I must write to you.

Adieu.

JANE TALBOT.

Letter XXV

_To the Same_

Nov. 3.

What is it, my friend, that makes thy influence over me so absolute? No resolution of mine can stand against your remonstrances. A single word, a look, approving or condemning, transforms me into a new creature. The dread of having offended you gives me the most pungent distress. Your "well done" lifts me above all reproach. It is only when you are distant, when your verdict is uncertain, that I shrink from contumely,--that the scorn of the world, though unmerited, is a load too heavy for my strength.

Methinks I should be a strange creature if left to myself. A very different creature, doubtless, I should have been, if placed under any other guidance. So easily swayed am I by one that is lord of my affections. No will, no reason, have I of my own.

Such sudden and total transitions! In solitude I ruminate and form my schemes. They seem to me unalterable: yet a word from you scatters all my laboured edifices, and I look back upon my former state of mind as on something that pa.s.sed when I was a lunatic or dreaming.

It is but a day since I determined to part with you,--since a thousand tormenting images engrossed my imagination: yet now am I quite changed; I am bound to you by links stronger than ever. No, I will not part with you.

Yet how shall I excuse my non-compliance to my mother? I have told her that I would come to her, that I waited only for her directions as to the disposal of her property. What will be her disappointment when I tell her that I will not come!--when she finds me, in spite of her remonstrances, still faithful to my engagements to thee!

Is there no method of removing this aversion? of outrooting this deadly prejudice? And must I, in giving myself to thee, forfeit her affection?

And now--this dreadful charge! no wonder that her affectionate heart was sorely wounded by such seeming proofs of my wickedness.

I thought at first--shame upon my inconsistent character, my incurable blindness! I should never have doubted the truth of my first thoughts, if you had not helped me to a more candid conjecture. I was unjust enough to load _him_ with the guilt of this plot against me, and imagined there was duty in forbearing to detect it.

Now, by thy means, do I judge otherwise. Yet how, my friend, shall I unravel this mystery? My heart is truly sad. How easily is my woman's courage lowered, and how p.r.o.ne am I to despond!

Lend me thy aid, thy helping hand, my beloved. Decide and act for me, and be my weakness fortified, my hope restored, by thee. Let me lose all separate feelings, all separate existence, and let me know no principle of action but the decision of your judgment, no motive or desire but to please, to gratify you.

Our marriage, you say, will facilitate reconcilement with my mother. Do you think so? Then let it take place, my dear Hal. Heaven permit that marriage may tend to reconcile! but, let it reconcile or not, if the wish be yours it shall occupy the chief place in my heart. The time, the manner, be it yours to prescribe. My happiness, on that event, will surely want but little to complete it; and, if you bid me not despair of my mother's acquiescence, I _will_ not despair.

I am to send your letter, after reading, to my mother, I suppose. I have read it, Hal, more than once. And for my sake thou declinest her offers! When you thus refuse no sacrifice on my account, shall I hesitate when it becomes my turn? Shall I ever want grat.i.tude, thinkest thou? Shall I ever imagine that I have done enough to evince my grat.i.tude?

But how do I forget thy present situation! Thy dying friend has scarcely occurred to me. Thy afflictions, thy fatigues, are absorbed in my own selfish cares.

I am very often on the brink of hating myself. So much thoughtlessness of others; such callousness to sorrows not my own: my hard heart has often reproached thee for sparing a sigh or a wish from me; that every gloom has not been dispelled by my presence, was treason, forsooth, against my majesty, and the murmurs that delighted love should breathe, to welcome thy return, were changed into half-vindictive reluctance,--not quite a frown,--and upbraidings, in which tenderness was almost turned out of door by anger.

In the present case, for instance, I have scarcely thought of thy dying friend once. How much thy disquiets would be augmented by the letters which I sent thee, never entered my thoughts. To hide our sorrows from those who love us seems to be no more than generous. Yet I never hid any thing from thee. All was uttered that was felt. I considered not attending circ.u.mstances. The bird, as soon as it was scared, flew into the bosom that was nearest, and, merely occupied with dangers of its own, was satisfied to find a refuge there.

_And yet_--See now, Vanity, the cunning advocate, entering with his _And yet_. Would I listen to him, what a world of palliations and apologies would he furnish! How would he remind me of cases in which my sympathy was always awakened with attention! How often--But I will not listen to the flatterer.

And, now I think of it, Hal, you differ from me very much in that respect. Every mournful secret must be wrung from you. You h.o.a.rd up all your evil thoughts, and brood over them alone. Nothing but earnest importunity ever got from you any of your griefs.

Now, this is cruel to yourself and unjust to me. It is denying my claim to confidence. It is holding back from me a part of yourself. It is setting light by my sympathy.

And yet--the prater Vanity once more, you see: but I will let him speak out this time. Here his apology is yours, and myself am only flattered indirectly.

And yet, when I have extorted from you any secret sorrow, you have afterwards acknowledged that the disclosure was of use:--that my sympathizing love was grateful to you, and my counsel of some value; that you drew from my conduct on those occasions new proofs of my strength of mind, and of my right--a right which my affection for you gave me--to share with you all your thoughts.

Yet, on the next occasion that offers, you are sure to relapse into your habitual taciturnity, and my labours to subdue it are again to be repeated. I have sometimes been tempted to retaliate, and convince you, by the effects of my concealments upon you, of the error of your own scheme.

But I never could persist in silence for five minutes together. Shut up as the temple of my heart is to the rest of mankind, all its doors fly open of their own accord when you approach.

Now am I got into my usual strain; in which I could persevere forever.-- No wonder it charms me so much, since, while thus pursuing it, I lose all my cares in a sweet oblivion; but I must stop at last, and recall my thoughts to a less welcome subject.

Painful as it is, I must write to my mother. I will do it now, and send you my letter. I will endeavour, hereafter, to keep alive a salutary distrust of myself, and do nothing without your approbation and direction.

Such submission becomes thy

JANE.

Letter XXVI

_To Mrs. Fielder_

Philadelphia, November 4.

I tremble thus to approach my honoured mother once more, since I cannot bring into her presence the heart that she wishes to find. Instead of acknowledgment of faults, and penitence suitable to their heinous nature, I must bring with me a bosom free from self-reproach, and a confidence, which innocence only can give, that I shall be some time able to disprove the charge brought against me.

Ah, my mother! could such guilt as this ever stain a heart fashioned by your tenderest care? Did it never occur to you that possibly some mistake might have misled the witness against me?

The letter which you sent me is partly mine. All that is honest and laudable is mine, but that which confesses dishonour has been added by another hand. By whom my handwriting was counterfeited, and for what end, I know not. I cannot name any one who deserves to be suspected.

I might proceed to explain the circ.u.mstances attending the writing and the loss of this letter, so fatal to me; but I forbear to attempt to justify myself by means which, I know beforehand, will effect nothing, unless it be to aggravate, in your eyes, my imaginary guilt.

If it were possible for you to suspend your judgment; if the most open, and earnest, and positive averments of my innocence could induce you, not to reverse, but merely to postpone, your sentence, you would afford me unspeakable happiness.

You tell me that the loss of your present bounty will be the consequence of my marriage. My claims on you are long ago at an end.

Indeed, I never had any claims. Your treatment of me has flown from your unconstrained benevolence. For what you have given, for the tenderness which you continually bestowed on me, you have received only disappointment and affliction.

For all your favours I seem to you ungrateful; yet long after that conduct was known which, to you, proves my unworthiness, your protection has continued, and you are so good as to a.s.sure me that it shall not be withdrawn as long as I have no protector but you.

Dear as my education has made the indulgences of competence to me, I hope I shall relinquish them without a sigh. Had you done nothing more than screen my infancy and youth from hardship and poverty, than supply the mere needs of nature, my debt to you could never be paid.