Cord and Creese

by James De Mille

  CHAPTER XXVII.

  JOURNAL OF PAOLO LANGHETTI.

  When Mrs. Thornton saw Despard next she showed him a short note whichshe had just received from her brother, accompanying his journal. Nearlytwo years had elapsed since she had last heard from him.

  His journal was written as before at long intervals, and was as follows:

  Halifax, April 10, 1847.--I exist here, but nothing more. Nothing isoffered by this small colonial town that can afford interest. Life goeson monotonously. The officers and their families are what they are everywhere. They are amiable and pleasant, and try to get the best out oflife. The townspeople are hospitable, and there is much refinement amongthem.

  But I live for the most part in a cottage outside of the town, whereI can be secluded and free from observation. Near my house is theNorthwest Arm. I cross it in a boat, and am at once in a savagewilderness. From the summit of a hill, appropriately named Mount Misery,I can look down upon this city which is bordered by such a wilderness.

  The winter has passed since my last entry, and nothing has occurred. Ihave learned to skate. I went out on a moose-hunt with Colonel Despard.The gigantic horns of a moose which I killed are now over the door of mystudio. I have joined in some festivities, and have done the honors ofmy house. It is an old-fashioned wooden structure which they call thePriory.

  So the winter has passed, and April is now here. In this country thereis no spring. Snow is yet on the ground. Winter is transformed graduallytill summer. I must keep up my fires till June, they say.

  During the winter I have guarded my treasure well. I took a house onpurpose to have a home for her. But her melancholy continued, and thestate of mind in which I found her still endures. Will it ever change?I gave out here that she was a relative who was in ill health. But thewinter has passed, and she remains precisely the same. Can she live onlong in this mood?

  At length I have decided to try a change for her. The Holy Sisterhoodof Mercy have a convent here, where she may find a higher and pureratmosphere than any where else. There I have placed her. I have toldnothing of her story. They think she is in grief for the death offriends. They have received her with that warm sympathy and holy lovewhich it is the aim of their life to cherish.

  O mater alma Christ! carissima, Te nunc flagitant devota corda et ora, Ora pro nobis!

  August 5, 1847.--The summer goes on pleasantly. A bracing climate, acool sea-breeze, fishing and hunting in the forests, sailing in theharbor--these are the amusements which one can find if he has theleisure.

  She has been among the Sisterhood of Mercy for some months. The deepcalm of that holy retreat has soothed her, but only this much, that hermelancholy has not lessened but grown more placid. She is in the midstof those whose thoughts are habitually directed to that work which shelongs after. The home from which she has been exiled is the desire oftheir hearts. They aim after that place for which she longs with so deepa longing. There is sympathy in all those hearts with one another. Shehears in their chants and prayers those hopes and desires, and these arebut the utterances of what she feels.

  Here they sing the matchless Rhythm of Bernard de Morlaix, and in thesewords she finds the highest expression that human words can give of thethoughts and desires of her soul. They tell me that the first time theysang it, as they came to this passage she burst into tears and sank downalmost senseless:

  O bona patria! lumina sobria te speculantur, Ad tua nomina sobria lumina collacrimantur: Et tua mentio pectoris unctis, cura doloris, Concipientibus aethers mentibus ignis amoris.

  November 17.--The winter must soon be here again.

  My treasure is well guarded by the Holy Sisterhood. They revere her andlook upon her as a saint. They tell me wonderful things about her whichhave sunk into my soul. They think that she is another Saint Cecilia, orrather Saint Teresa, the Saint of Love and Longing.

  She told them once that she was not a Catholic, but that any form ofworship was sweet and precious to her--most of all, the lofty utterancesof the prayers and hymns of the Church. She will not listen to dogmas,but says that God wishes only love and praise. Yet she joins in alltheir rites, and in this House, where Love is chiefly adored, shesurpasses all in the deep love of her heart.

  January 2, 1848.--I have seen her for the first time in many months. Shesmiled. I never saw her smile before, except once in the ship, when Itold my name and made her mother take my place in the cabin.

  She smiled. It was as if an angel from heaven had smiled on me. Do I notbelieve that she is one?

  They all say that she is unchanged. Her sadness has had no abatement. Onthat meeting she made an effort for my sake to stoop to me. Perhapsshe saw how my very soul entreated her to speak. So she spoke of theSisterhood, and said she loved them all. I asked her if she was happierhere than at my house. She said "No." I did not know whether to feelrejoiced or sorrowful. Then she told me something which has filled mewith wonder ever since.

  She asked me if I had been making inquiries about her family, for I hadsaid that I would. I told her that I had. She asked what I had heard. Ihesitated for a moment, and at last, seeing that she was superior to anysorrow of bereavement; I told her all about the sad fate of her brotherLouis, which your old friend Courtenay Despard had communicated to hisuncle here. She listened without emotion, and at last, looking earnestlyat me, said,

  "_He is not dead!_"

  I stood amazed. I had seen the very newspapers which contained anaccount of his death, I had read the letters of Courtenay Despard, whichshowed how painstaking his search had been. Had he not traveled to everyplace where he could hear any thing of the Brandons? Had he not writtenat the very outset wherever he could hope to hear any thing? I did notknow what to say.

  For Louis Brandon is known to have fallen overboard from the ship Java,during a tremendous monsoon, several hundred miles away from any land.How could he possibly have escaped death? The Captain, whom CourtenayDespard found out and questioned, said he threw over a hen-coop and apail. These could not save him. Despard also inquired for months fromevery ship that arrived from those parts, but could learn nothing. Thenext ship that came from New South Wales foundered off the coast ofAfrica. Three passengers escaped to Sierra Leone, and thence to England.Despard learned their names, but they were not Brandon. The informationwhich one of them, named Wheeler, gave to the ship-owners affordedno hope of his having been found by this ship, even if it had beenpossible. It was simply impossible, however, for the _Falcon_ did notpass the spot where poor Brandon fell overboard till months had elapsed.

  All these things I knew, and they came to my mind. She did not noticemy emotion, but after a pause she looked at me again with the sameearnestness, and said,

  "_My brother Frank is not dead._"

  This surprised me as much as the other.

  "Are you sure?" said I, reverently.

  "I am."

  "How did you learn this? All who have inquired say that both of yourbrothers are dead."

  "They told me," said she, "many times. _They_ said that my brothers hadnot come among them to their own place, as they would have had to comeif they had left the earth."

  She spoke solemnly and with mysterious emphasis. I said nothing, for Iknew not what to say.

  On going home and thinking over this, I saw that she believed herselfto have the power of communicating with the departed. I did not knowwhether this intelligence, which she believed she had received, hadbeen gained in her trance, or whether she thought that she had recentinterviews with those on high. I went to see her again, and asked this.She told me that once since her recovery she had fallen into that state,and had been, as she called it, "in her home."

  I ventured to ask her more about what she considered a communion withthe departed. She tried to speak, but looked like one who could not findwords. It was still the same as before. She has in her mind thoughtswhich can not be expressed by any human language. She will not be ableto express them till such a language is obtained. Yet she gave me oneidea, which has be
en in my mind ever since.

  She said that the language of those among whom she has been has nothingon earth which is like it except music. If our music could be developedto an indefinite extent it might at last begin to resemble it. Yetshe said that she sometimes heard strains here in the Holy Mass whichreminded her of that language, and might be intelligible to an immortal.

  This is the idea which she imparted to me, and I have thought of it eversince.

  August 23--Great things have happened.

  When I last wrote I had gained the idea of transforming music into alanguage. The thought came to me that I, who thirst for music, and loveit and cherish it above all things--to whom it is an hourly comfort andsolace--that I might rise to utter forth to her sounds which she mighthear. I had already seen enough of her spiritual tone to know whatsympathies and emotions might best be acted upon. I saw her severaltimes, so as to stimulate myself to a higher and purer exercise ofwhatever genius I may have.

  I was encouraged by the thought that from my earliest childhood, as Ibegan to learn to speak so I began to learn to sing. As I learned toread printed type so I read printed music. The thoughts of composers inmusic thus became as legible to me as those of composers in words. Soall my life my knowledge has widened, and with that knowledge my lovehas increased. This has been my one aim in life--my joy and my delight.Thus it came to pass that at last, when alone with my Cremona, I couldutter all my own thoughts, and pour forth every feeling that was in myheart. This was a language with me. I spoke it, yet there was no one whocould understand it fully. Only one had I ever met with to whom I toldthis besides yourself--she could accompany me--she could understand andfollow me wherever I led. I could speak this language to her, and shecould hear and comprehend. This one was my Bice.

  Now that she had told me this I grasped at the thought. Never before hadthe idea entered my mind of trying upon her the effect of my music. Ihad given it up for her sake while she was with me, not liking to causeany sound to disturb her rapt and melancholy mood.

  But now I began to understand how it was with her. She had learned thelanguage of the highest places and had heard the New Song. She stood farabove me, and if she could not understand my music it would be from thesame reason that a grown man can not comprehend the words of a lisping,stammering child. She had that language in its fullness. I had it onlyin its crudest rudiments.

  Now Bice learned my words and followed me. She knew my utterance. Iwas the master--she the disciple. But here was one who could lead me. Iwould be the follower and disciple. From her I could learn more than inall my life I could ever discover by my own unassisted efforts.

  It was mine, therefore, to struggle to overcome the lisping, stammeringutterance of my purely earthly music; to gain from her some knowledge ofthe mood of that holier, heavenly expression, so that at last I mightbe able in some degree to speak to this exile the language of the homewhich she loved; that we, by holding commune in this language, mightrise together to a higher spiritual realm, and that she in her solitudemight receive at least some associate.

  So I proposed to her to come back and stay with me again. She consentedat once.

  Before that memorable evening I purified my heart by fasting and prayer.I was like one who was seeking to ascend into heaven to take part inthat celestial communion, to join in the New Song, the music of theangels.

  By fasting and prayer I sought so to ascend, and to find thoughts andfit utterance for those thoughts. I looked upon my office as similar tothat of the holy prophets of old. I felt that I had a power of utteranceif the Divine One would only inspire.

  I fasted and prayed that so I might reduce this grosser material frame,and sharpen and quicken every nerve, and stimulate every fibre of thebrain. So alone could I most nearly approach to the commune of spirits.Thus had those saints and prophets of old done when they had enteredupon the search after this communion, and they had received theirreward, even the visitation of angels and the vision of the blessed.

  A prophet--yes--now, in these days, it is left for the prophet to utterforth his inspiration by no other way than that of music.

  So I fasted and prayed. I took up the words from the holy priesthood,and I said, as they say:

  Munda cor meum, ac labia mea, Omnipotens Deus, qui labia Isaiaeprophetae, calculo mundasti ignito!

  For so Isaiah had been exalted till he heard the language of heaven, themusic of the seraphim.

  She, my divinity, my adored, enshrined again in my house, bore herselfas before--kind to me and gentle beyond all expression, but withthoughts of her own that placed between us a gulf as wide as that whichseparates the mortal from the immortal.

  On that evening she was with me in the parlor which looks out upon theNorthwest Arm. The moon shone down there, the dark, rocky hills on theopposite side rose in heavy masses. The servants were away in the city.We were alone.

  Ah, my Cremona! if a material instrument were ever able to utter forthsounds to which immortals might listen, thou, best gift of my father,thou canst utter them!

  "You are pale," said she, for she was always kindly and affectionate asa mother with a child, as a guardian angel with his ward. "You are pale.You always forget yourself for others, and now you suffer anxiety forme. Do not suffer. I have my consolations."

  I did not make any reply, but took my Cremona, and sought to lift up allmy soul to a level with hers, to that lofty realm where her spirit everwandered, that so I might not be comfortless. She started at the firsttone that I struck forth, and looked at me with her large, earnest eyes.I found my own gaze fixed on hers, rapt and entranced. Now there cameat last the inspiration so longed for, so sought for. It came from whereher very soul looked forth into mine, out of the glory of her lustrous,spiritual eyes. They grew brighter with an almost immortal radiance, andall my heart rose up till it seemed ready to burst in the frenzy of thatinspired moment.

  Now I felt the spirit of prophecy, I felt the afflatus of the inspiredsibyl or seer, and the voice of music which for a lifetime I had soughtto utter forth now at last sounded as I longed that it should sound.

  I exulted in that sound. I knew that at last I had caught the tone, andfrom her. I knew its meaning and exulted, as the poet or the musicianmust always exult when some idea sublimer than any which he has everknown is wafted over his upturned spiritual gaze.

  She shared my exaltation. There came over her face swiftly, like thelightning flash, an expression of surprise and joy. So the face of theexile lightens up at the throbbing of his heart, when, in some foreignland, he suddenly and unexpectedly hears the sound of his own language.So his eyes light up, and his heart beats faster, and even amidst thevery longing of his soul after home, the desire after that home isappeased by these its most hallowed associations.

  And the full meaning of that eloquent gaze of hers as her soul lookedinto mine became all apparent to me. "Speak on," it said; "sound on, ohstrains of the language of my home! Unheard so long, now heard at last."

  I knew that I was comprehended. Now all the feelings of the melancholymonths came rushing over my heart, and all the holiest ideas which hadanimated my life came thronging into my mind, bursting forth into tones,as though of their own accord, involuntarily, as words come forth in adream.

  "Oh thou," I said, in that language which my own lips could notutter--"oh thou whom I saved from the tomb, the life to which I restoredthee is irksome; but there remains a life to which at last thou shaltattain.

  "Oh thou," I said, "whose spirit moves among the immortals, I am mortalyet immortal! My soul seeks commune with them. I yearn after thatcommunion. Life here on earth is not more dear to me than to thee. Helpme to rise above it. Thou hast been on high, show me too the way.

  "Oh thou," I said, "who hast seen things ineffable, impart to me thyconfidence. Let me know thy secret. Receive me as the companion of thysoul. Shut not thyself up in solitude. Listen, I can speak thy language.

  "Attend," I cried, "for it is not for nothing that the Divine Onehas sent thee back. Live not
these mortal days in loneliness and inuselessness. Regard thy fellow-mortals and seek to bless them. Thou hastlearned the mystery of the highest. Let me be thine interpreter. Allthat thou hast learned I will communicate to man.

  "Rise up," I cried, "to happiness and to labor. Behold! I give thee apurpose in life. Blend thy soul with mine, and let me utter thy thoughtsso that men shall hear and understand. For I know that the highest truthof highest Heaven means nothing more than love. Gather up all thy love,let it flow forth to thy fellow-men. This shall be at once the labor andthe consolation of thy life."

  Now all this, and much more--far more--was expressed in the tones thatflowed from my Cremona. It was all in my heart. It came forth. It wasapprehended by her. I saw it, I knew it, and I exulted. Her eyes dilatedmore widely--my words were not unworthy of her hearing. I then was ableto tell something which could rouse her from her stupor. Oh, Music!Divine Music! What power thou hast over the soul!

  There came over her face an expression which I never saw before; one ofpeace ineffable--the peace that passeth understanding. Ah me! I seemedto draw her to myself. For she rose and walked toward me. And a greatcalm came over my own soul. My Cremona spoke of peace--soft, sweet, anddeep; the profound peace that dwelleth in the soul which has its hopein fruition. The tone widened into sweet modulation--sweet beyond allexpression.

  She was so close that she almost touched me. Her eyes were still fixedon mine. Tears were there, but not tears of sorrow. Her face was soclose to mine that my strength left me. My arms dropped downward. Themusic was over.

  "I DID NOT MAKE ANY REPLY, BUT TOOK MY CREMONA, ANDSOUGHT TO LIFT UP ALL MY SOUL TO A LEVEL WITH HERS."]

  She held out her hand to me. I caught it in both of mine, and wet itwith my tears.

  "Paolo," said she, in a voice of musical tone; "Paolo, you are alreadyone of us. You speak our language.

  "You have taught me something which flows from love--duty. Yes, wewill labor together; and they who live on high will learn even in theirradiant home to envy us poor mortals."

  I said not a word, but knelt; and holding her hand still, I looked up ather in grateful adoration.

  November 28.--For the last three months I have lived in heaven. Sheis changed. Music has reconciled her to exile. She has found one whospeaks, though weakly, the language of that home.

  We hold together through this divine medium a lofty spiritedintercourse. I learn from her of that starry world in which for a brieftime she was permitted to dwell. Her seraphic thoughts have becomecommunicated to me. I have made them my own, and all my spirit has risento a higher altitude.

  So I have at last received that revelation for which I longed, and thedivine thoughts with which she has inspired me I will make known to theworld. How? Description is inadequate, but it is enough to say that Ihave decided upon an Opera as the best mode of making known these ideas.

  I have reported to one of those classical themes which, though as old ascivilization, are yet ever new, because they are truth.

  My Opera is on the theme of Prometheus. It refers to PrometheusDelivered. My idea is derived from her. Prometheus represents DivineLove--since he is the god who suffers unendurable agonies through hislove for man. Zeus represents the old austere god of the sects andcreeds--the gloomy God of Vengeance--the stern--the inexorable--thecruel.

  Love endures through the ages, but at last triumphs. The chief agentin his triumph is Athene. She represents Wisdom, which, by its life andincrease, at last dethrones the God of Vengeance and enthrones the Godof Love.

  For so the world goes on; and thus it shall be that Human Understanding,which I have personified under Athene, will at last exalt Divine Loveover all, and cast aside its olden adoration of Divine Vengeance.

  I am trying to give to my Opera the severe simplicity of the classicalform, yet at the same time to pervade it all with the warm atmosphere oflove in its widest sense. It opens with a chorus of seraphim. Prometheuslaments; but the chief part is that of Athene. On that I have exhaustedmyself.

  But where can I get a voice that can adequately render mythoughts--_our_ thoughts? Where is Bice? She alone has this voice; shealone has the power of catching and absorbing into her own mind theideas which I form; and with it all, she alone could express them.I would wander over the earth to find her. But perhaps she is ina luxurious home, where her associates would not listen to such aproposal.

  Patience! perhaps Bice may at last bring her marvelous voice to my aid.

  December 15.--Every day our communion has grown more exalted. Shebreathes upon me the atmosphere of that radiant world, and fills my soulwith rapture. I live in a sublime enthusiasm. We hold intercourse bymeans of music. We stand upon a higher plane than that of commonmen. She has raised me there, and has made me to be a partaker in herthoughts.

  Now I begin to understand something of the radiant world to which shewas once for a brief time borne. I know her lost joys; I share in herlongings. In me, as in her, there is a deep, unquenchable thirst afterthose glories that are present there. All here seems poor and mean. Nomaterial pleasure can for a moment allure.

  I live in a frenzy. My soul is on fire. Music is my sole thought andutterance. Colonel Despard thinks that I am mad. My friends here pityme. I smile within myself when I think of pity being given by them tome. Kindly souls! could they but have one faint idea of the unspeakablejoys to which I have attained!

  My Cremona is my voice. It expresses all things for me. Ah, sweetcompanion of my soul's flight! my Guide, my Guardian Angel, my Inspirer!had ever before two mortals while on earth a lot like ours? Whoelse besides us in this life ever learned the joys of pure spiritualcommunion? We rise on high together. Our souls are borne up in company.When we hold commune we cease to be mortals.

  My Opera is finished. The radiancy of that Divine Love which hasinundated all the being of Edith has been imparted to me in some measuresufficient to enable me to breathe forth to human ears tones which havebeen caught from immortal voices. She has given me ideas. I have madethem audible and intelligible to men.

  I have had one performance of my work, or rather our work, for it is allhers. Hers are the thoughts, mine is only the expression.

  I sought out a place of solitude in which I might perform undisturbedand without interruption the theme which I have tried to unfold.

  Opposite my house is a wild, rocky shore covered with the primevalwoods. Here in one place there rises a barren rock, perfectly bare ofverdure, which is called Mount Misery. I chose his place as the spotwhere I might give my rehearsal.

  She was the audience--I was the orchestra--we two were alone.

  Mount Misery is one barren rock without a blade of grass on all its darkiron-like surface. Around it is a vast accumulation of granite bouldersand vast rocky ledges. The trees are stunted, the very ferns canscarcely find a place to grow.

  It was night. There was not a cloud in the sky. The moon shone withmarvelous lustre.

  Down in front of us lay the long arm of the sea that ran up between usand the city. On the opposite side were woods, and beyond them rose thecitadel, on the other side of which the city lay nestling at its baselike those Rhenish towns which lie at the foot of feudal castles.

  On the left hand all was a wilderness; on the right, close by, was asmall lake, which seemed like a sheet of silver in the moon's rays.Farther on lay the ocean, stretching in its boundless extent away tothe horizon. There lay islands and sand-banks with light-houses.There, under the moon, lay a broad path of golden light--moltengold--unruffled--undisturbed in that dead calm.

  My Opera begins with an Alleluia Chorus. I have borrowed words from theAngel Song at the opening of "Faust" for my score. But the music has anexpression of its own, and the words are feeble; and the only comfortis, that these words will be lost in the triumph strain of the tonesthat accompany them.

  She was with me, exulting where I was exultant, sad where I wassorrowful; still with her air of Guide and Teacher. She is my Egeria.She is my Inspiring Muse. I invoke her when I sing.


  But my song carried her away. Her own thoughts expressed by my utterancewere returned to her, and she yielded herself up altogether to theirpower.

  Ah me! there is one language common to all on earth, and to all inheaven, and that is music.

  I exulted then on that bare, blasted rock. I triumphed. She joined me init all. We exulted together. We triumphed. We mourned, we rejoiced, wedespaired, we hoped, we sung alleluias in our hearts. The very windswere still. The very moon seemed to stay her course. All nature washushed.

  She stood before me, white, slender, aerial, like a spirit from on high,as pure, as holy, as stainless. Her soul and mine were blended. We movedto one common impulse. We obeyed one common motive.

  What is this? Is it love? Yes; but not as men call love. Ours isheavenly love, ardent, but yet spiritual; intense, but without passion;a burning love like that of the cherubim; all-consuming, all-engrossing,and enduring for evermore.

  Have I ever told her my admiration? Yes; but not in words. I have toldher so in music, in every tone, in every strain. She knows that I amhers. She is my divinity, my muse, my better genius--the nobler half ofmy soul.

  I have laid all my spirit at her feet, as one prostrates himself beforea divinity. She has accepted that adoration and has been pleased.

  We are blended. We are one, but not after an earthly fashion, for neveryet have I even touched her hand in love. It is our spirits, our realselves--not our merely visible selves--that love; yet that love is sointense that I would die for evermore if my death could make her lifemore sweet.

  She has heard all this from my Cremona.

  Here, as we stood under the moon, I thought her a spirit with a mortallover. I recognized the full meaning of the sublime legend of Numa andEgeria. The mortal aspires in purity of heart, and the immortal comesdown and assists and responds to his aspirations.

  Our souls vibrated in unison to the expression of heavenly thoughts. Wethrew ourselves into the rapture of the hour. We trembled, we thrilled,till at last frail mortal nature could scarcely endure the intensity ofthat perfect joy.

  So we came to the end. The end is a chorus of angels. They sing thedivinest of songs that is written in Holy Revelation. All the glory ofthat song reaches its climax in the last strain:

  "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes!"

  We wept together. But we dried our tears and went home, musing on that"tearless eternity" which lies before us.

  Morning is dawning as I write, and all the feeling of my soul can beexpressed in one word, the sublimest of all words, which is intelligibleto many of different languages and different races. I will end withthis:

  "Alleluia!"