Chapter 42 - Page 2

fear penury; I was not tried with suspense. By every vessel he wrote; he wrote as he gave and as he loved, in full-handed full-hearted plenitude. He wrote because he liked to write; he did not abridge, because he cared not to abridge. He sat down, he took pen and paper, because he loved Lucy and had much to say to her; because he was faithful and thoughtful, because he was tender and true. There was no sham and no cheat, and no hollow unreal in him. Apology never dropped her slippery oil on his lips -- never proffered, by his pen, her coward feints and paltry nullities: he would give neither a stone, nor an excuse -- neither a scorpion, nor a disappointment; his letters were real food that nourished, living water that refreshed.

And was I grateful? God knows! I believe that scarce a living being so remembered, so sustained, dealt with in kind so constant, honourable and noble, could be otherwise than grateful to the death.

Adherent to his own religion (in him was not the stuff of which is made the facile apostate), he freely left me my pure faith. He did not tease nor tempt. He said: --

'Remain a Protestant. My little English Puritan, I love Protestantism in you. I own its severe charm. There is something in its ritual I cannot receive myself, but it is the sole creed for "Lucy."'

All Rome could not put into him bigotry, nor the Propaganda itself make him a real Jesuit. He was born honest, and not false -- artless, and not cunning -- a freeman, and not a slave. His tenderness had rendered him ductile in a priest's hands, his affection, his devotedness, his sincere pious enthusiasm blinded his kind eyes sometimes, made him abandon justice to himself to do the work of craft, and serve the ends of selfishness; but these are faults so rare to find, so costly to their owner to indulge, we scarce know whether they will not one day be reckoned amongst the jewels.

And now the three years are past: M. Emanuel's return is fixed. It is autumn; he is to be with me ere the mists of November come. My school flourishes, my house is ready: I have made him a little library, filled its shelves with the books he left in my care: I have cultivated out of love for him (I was naturally no florist) the plants he preferred, and some of them are yet in bloom. I thought I loved him when he went away; I love him now in another degree; he is more my own.

The sun passes the equinox; the days shorten, the leaves grow sere; but -- he is coming.

Frosts appear at night; November has sent his fogs in advance; the wind takes its autumn moan; but -- he is coming.

The skies hang full and dark -- a rack sails from the west; the clouds cast themselves into strange forms -- arches and broad radiations; there rise resplendent morning -- glorious, royal, purple as monarch in his state; the heavens are one flame; so wild are they, they rival battle at its thickest -- so bloody, they shame Victory in