"I know what you say is reasonable--is just; but, dear Edward, she
is my mother, and she is alone."
I yielded to her wishes. Could I else? My letter to her mother
concluded with a respectful entreaty that she would take apartments
in our dwelling, and a chair at our table, and lessen, to this
extent, the expenses of her own establishment.
"What!" exclaimed the frenzied woman to Julia's aunt, to whom the
charge of presenting the communication was committed--"what! eat
the bread of that insolent and ungrateful wretch? Never! never!"
She flung the epistle from her with disdain; and, to confess a truth,
though, on Julia's account, I should have wished a reconciliation,
I was by no means sorry, on my own, that such was her ultimatum. I
gave myself little further concern about this foolish person, and
was happy to see that in a short time my wife appeared to recover
from the sadness and stupor which the death of her father and the
temper of her mother had naturally induced. The truth is, she had,
for so long a period previously to her marriage, suffered from the
persecutions of the latter, and moaned over the shame and imbecility
of the former, that her present situation was one of great relief,
and, for a while, of comparative happiness.
We lived in a pleasant cottage in the suburbs. A broad and placid
lake spread out before our dwelling; and its tiny billows, under
the pressure of the sweet southwestern breezes, beat almost against
our very doors. Green and shady groves environed us on three sides,
and sheltered us from the intrusive gaze of the highway; and never
was a brighter collection of flowers and blossoms clustered around
any habitation of hope and happiness before. I rented the cottage
on moderate terms, and furnished it neatly, but simply, as became
my resources. All things considered, the prospect was fair and
promising before us. Julia had few toils, and ample leisure for
painting and music, for both of which she had considerable taste;
for the former art, in particular, she possessed no small talent.
Our city, indeed, seemed one peculiarly calculated for these arts.
Our sky was blue--deeply, beautifully blue; our climate mild and
delightful. Our people were singularly endowed with the genius
for graceful and felicitous performances. Music was an ordinary
attribute of the great mass; and in no community under the sun was
there such an overflow of talent in painting and sculpture. It was
the grand error of our wise heads to fancy that our city could be
made one of great trade; and, in a vain struggle to give it some
commercial superiority over its neighbor communities, the wealth
of the people was thrown away upon projects that yielded nothing;
and the arts were left neglected in a region which might have
been made--and might still be made--if not exclusively, at least
pre-eminently their own. The ordinary look of the women was beauty,
the ordinary accent was sweetness. The soft moonlight evenings were
rendered doubly harmonious by the tender tinkling of the wandering
guitar, or the tones of the plaintive flute; while, from every
third dwelling, rose the more stately but scarcely sweeter melodies
stricken by pliant fingers from the yielding soul of the divine
piano. The tastes even of the mechanic were refined by this language,
the purest In which passion ever speaks; and an ambition--the result
of the highest tone of aristocratic influence upon society--prompted
his desires to purposes and a position to which in other regions
he is not often permitted to aspire. These influences were assisted
by the peculiar location of our city--by its suburban freedom from all
closeness; its innumerable gardens, the appanage of every household;
its piazzas, verandahs, porches; its broad and minstrel-wooing rivers;
and the majestic and evergreen forests, which grew and gathered
around us on every hand. If ever there was a city intended by nature
more particularly than another for the abodes and the offices of
art, it was ours. It will become so yet: the mean, money-loving
soul of trade can not always keep it from its destinies. We may
never see it in our day; but so surely as we live, and as it shall
live, will it become an Athens in our land--a city of empire by
the sea, renowned for genius and taste--and the chosen retreat of
muses, younger and more vigorous, and not less lovely, than the
old!