The Annotated Little Women
Page 66
“MY BETH.
“Sitting patient in the shadow
Till the blessed light shall come,
A serene and saintly presence
Sanctifies our troubled home.
Earthly joys, and hopes, and sorrows,
Break like ripples on the strand
Of the deep and solemn river
Where her willing feet now stand.
“Oh, my sister, passing from me,
Out of human care and strife,
Leave me, as a gift, those virtues
Which have beautified your life.
Dear, bequeath me that great patience
Which has power to sustain
A cheerful, uncomplaining spirit
In its prison-house of pain.
“Give me, for I need it sorely,
Of that courage, wise and sweet,
Which has made the path of duty
Green beneath your willing feet.
Give me that unselfish nature,
That with charity divine
Can pardon wrong for love’s dear sake—
Meek heart, forgive me mine!
“Thus our parting daily loseth
Something of its bitter pain,
And while learning this hard lesson,
My great loss becomes my gain.
For the touch of grief will render
My wild nature more serene,
Give to life new aspirations—
A new trust in the unseen.
“Henceforth, safe across the river,
I shall see forever more
A beloved, household spirit
Waiting for me on the shore.
Hope and faith, born of my sorrow,
Guardian angels shall become,
And the sister gone before me,
By their hands shall lead me home.”11
Blurred and blotted, faulty and feeble as the lines were, they brought a look of inexpressible comfort to Beth’s face, for her one regret had been that she had done so little; and this seemed to assure her that her life had not been useless—that her death would not bring the despair she feared. As she sat with the paper folded between her hands, the charred log fell asunder. Jo started up, revived the blaze, and crept to the bedside, hoping Beth slept.
“Not asleep, but so happy, dear. See, I found this and read it; I knew you wouldn’t care. Have I been all that to you, Jo?” she asked, with wistful, humble earnestness.
“Oh, Beth, so much, so much!” and Jo’s head went down upon the pillow, beside her sister’s.
“Then I don’t feel as if I’d wasted my life. I’m not so good as you make me, but I have tried to do right; and now, when it’s too late to begin even to do better, it’s such a comfort to know that some one loves me so much, and feels as if I’d helped her.”
“More than any one in the world, Beth. I used to think I couldn’t let you go; but I’m learning to feel that I don’t lose you; that you’ll be more to me than ever, and death can’t part us, though it seems to.”
“I know it cannot, and I don’t fear it any longer, for I’m sure I shall be your Beth still, to love and help you more than ever. You must take my place, Jo, and be everything to father and mother when I’m gone. They will turn to you—don’t fail them; and if it’s hard to work alone, remember that I don’t forget you, and that you’ll be happier in doing that, than writing splendid books, or seeing all the world; for love is the only thing that we can carry with us when we go, and it makes the end so easy.”
“I’ll try, Beth;” and then and there Jo renounced her old ambition, pledged herself to a new and better one, acknowledging the poverty of other desires, and feeling the blessed solace of a belief in the immortality of love.
So the spring days came and went, the sky grew clearer, the earth greener, the flowers were up fair and early, and the birds came back in time to say good-by to Beth, who, like a tired but trustful child, clung to the hands that had led her all her life,12 as father and mother guided her tenderly through the valley of the shadow, and gave her up to God.
Seldom, except in books, do the dying utter memorable words, see visions, or depart with beatified countenances; and those who have sped many parting souls know, that to most the end comes as naturally and simply as sleep. As Beth had hoped, the “tide went out easily”; and in the dark hour before the dawn, on the bosom where she had drawn her first breath, she quietly drew her last, with no farewell but one loving look and a little sigh.13
With tears, and prayers, and tender hands, mother and sisters made her ready for the long sleep that pain would never mar again—seeing with grateful eyes the beautiful serenity that soon replaced the pathetic patience that had wrung their hearts so long, and feeling with reverent joy, that to their darling death was a benignant angel—not a phantom full of dread.
1. The pleasantest room. During Lizzie Alcott’s last months, her family also made things as pleasant as possible for her, though they were not as quickly resigned to fate as were the Marches. Louisa wrote in her journal for October 1857, “Fit up a nice room for her, and hope home and love and care may keep her” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 85).
2. know no winter. In January 1858, Lizzie’s doctor pronounced her case hopeless, and the Alcotts came together to give her the best care they could. Alcott wrote, “Father came home; and Anna took the housekeeping, so that Mother and I could devote ourselves to her” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 88).
3. pot-hooks. The name given to the looping strokes that children were taught to make when learning to write.
4. full of blots and gratitude. Like Beth, Lizzie Alcott spent many of her last days trying to benefit others: “Lizzie makes little things, and drops them out of windows to the school-children, smiling to see their surprise. . . . Dear little saint! I shall be better all my life for these sad hours with you” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 88).
5. were very happy ones. During the first phases of her final decline, Lizzie was not as angelic a patient as her fictionalized counterpart. In early January 1858, her eldest sister Anna wrote to their father. “She has for a month been nervous, cross, & pretty disliked us all, & been wholly unlike herself. . . . She doesn’t care for any of us, & doesn’t want mother near her, thinks I am horrid, & only wants to be let alone to do her sewing.” Once she knew the worst, however, Lizzie became more Beth-like, accepting her fate with almost happy resignation. Anna wrote in the same letter that Lizzie was “very cheerful, & knows the truth, the whole, which she says she has known herself a long time and is glad it is to be so as she is ready & willing to go any time” (Anna Alcott to Bronson Alcott, January 6, 1858, manuscript letter, Houghton Library, Harvard University, bMS Am 1130.9).
6. put it down forever. Lizzie, too, put aside her needle in early March 1858, saying it was “too heavy” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 88).
7. was no help. Bronson Alcott captured the helplessness his family felt during Lizzie’s last days in the following poem:
“Ether,” she begged, “O Father give
“With parting kiss my lips doth seal
“Pure ether once, and let me live
“Forgetful of this death I feel.”
We had it not. Away she turns,
Denied the boon she dying asks,
Her kindling eye with rapture churns,
Immortal goblet takes and quaffs.
8. Shining Ones. When, in The Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian arrives at the River of Death, two men whose clothing shines like gold and whose faces shine like light offer him encouragement and advice. Once Christian has forded the river, the two shining ones greet him again and escort him up to the Celestial City (see Part First, Chapter XIII, Note 6).
9. “stronger when you are here.” Alcott wrote in her journal for November 1857, “Betty loves to have me with her; and I am with her at night, for Mother needs rest. Betty says she feels ‘strong’ when I am near. So glad to be of use” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 86).
11. “lead me home.” Alcott wrote the original version of this poem within a few days of her sister Lizzie’s death. Most of the revisions she made before publishing it here were minor. However, Alcott omitted the original second stanza:
Gentle pilgrim! First and fittest,
Of our little household band;
To journey trustfully before us
Hence into the silent land.
First, to teach us that love’s charm
Grows stronger being riven;
Fittest, to become the Angel
That shall beckon us to Heaven.
12. hands that had led her all her life. Four days before she died, Lizzie “lay in Father’s arms, and called us round her, smiling contentedly as she said, ‘All here!’ ” She held her family’s hands and “kissed us tenderly” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 88).
13. a little sigh. Around three a.m. on March 14, 1858, Elizabeth Sewall Alcott died at age twenty-two. Though she evidently did not see a vision, Alcott and her mother did. Moments after Lizzie’s passing, the two women “saw a light mist rise from the body, and float up and vanish in the air.” Lizzie’s doctor said it was “the life departing visibly” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 89). In an instance of fitting irony, the doctor was named Christian Geist.
When morning came, for the first time in many months the fire was out, Jo’s place was empty,14 and the room was very still. But a bird sang blithely on a budding bough, close by, the snow-drops blossomed freshly at the window, and the spring sunshine streamed in like a benediction over the placid face upon the pillow—a face so full of painless peace, that those who loved it best smiled through their tears, and thanked God that Beth was well at last.15
14. Jo’s place was empty. It may seem curious that it is Jo’s place, not Beth’s, that is specifically described as empty. But in real life, Lizzie’s death did signal a displacement for Louisa within her family. Before Lizzie’s illness, it had seemed logical that Lizzie would care for her parents in their old age, leaving Louisa relatively free to pursue her literary work. With Lizzie gone, Louisa was compelled to balance household concerns with her writing for the rest of her life.
15. Beth was well at last. Lizzie herself referred to her impending death as “get[ting] well” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 88). Five days after Lizzie’s death, Alcott used the same metaphor to transform death into healthy life. She wrote to her cousin Eliza Wells, “Our Lizzie is well at last, not in this world but another where I hope she will find nothing but rest from her long suffering” (Louisa May Alcott, Selected Letters, p. 32). In her journal, Alcott described a sight rather different from Beth’s countenance of painless peace: “What she had suffered was seen in the face, for at twenty-three [sic] she looked like a woman of forty, so worn was she, and all her pretty hair gone.” Alcott added philosophically, “So the first break comes, and I know what death means,—a liberator for her, a teacher for us” (Louisa May Alcott, Journals, p. 89).
CHAPTER XVIII.
Learning to Forget.
AMY’S lecture did Laurie good, though, of course, he did not own it till long afterward; men seldom do,—for when women are the advisers, the lords of creation don’t take the advice till they have persuaded themselves that it is just what they intended to do; then they act upon it, and, if it succeeds, they give the weaker vessel half the credit of it; if it fails, they generously give her the whole. Laurie went back to his grandfather, and was so dutifully devoted for several weeks that the old gentleman declared the climate of Nice had improved him wonderfully, and he had better try it again. There was nothing the young gentleman would have liked better,—but elephants could not have dragged him back after the scolding he had received; pride forbid,—and whenever the longing grew very strong, he fortified his resolution by repeating the words that had made the deepest impression,—“I despise you;” “Go and do something splendid that will make her love you.”
Laurie turned the matter over in his mind so often that he soon brought himself to confess that he had been selfish and lazy; but then when a man has a great sorrow, he should be indulged in all sorts of vagaries till he has lived it down. He felt that his blighted affections were quite dead now; and, though he should never cease to be a faithful mourner, there was no occasion to wear his weeds ostentatiously. Jo wouldn’t love him, but he might make her respect and admire him by doing something which should prove that a girl’s “No” had not spoilt his life. He had always meant to do something, and Amy’s advice was quite unnecessary. He had only been waiting till the aforesaid blighted affections were decently interred; that being done, he felt that he was ready to “hide his stricken heart, and still toil on.”1
As Goethe, when he had a joy or a grief, put it into a song, so Laurie resolved to embalm his love-sorrow in music, and compose a Requiem which should harrow up Jo’s soul and melt the heart of every hearer. So the next time the old gentleman found him getting restless and moody, and ordered him off, he went to Vienna,2 where he had musical friends, and fell to work with the firm determination to distinguish himself. But, whether the sorrow was too vast to be embodied in music, or music too ethereal to uplift a mortal woe, he soon discovered that the Requiem was beyond him, just at present. It was evident that his mind was not in working order yet, and his ideas needed clarifying; for often, in the middle of a plaintive strain, he would find himself humming a dancing tune that vividly recalled the Christmas ball at Nice,—especially the stout Frenchman,—and put an effectual stop to tragic composition for the time being.
Then he tried an Opera,—for nothing seemed impossible in the beginning,—but here, again, unforeseen difficulties beset him. He wanted Jo for his heroine, and called upon his memory to supply him with tender recollections and romantic visions of his love. But memory turned traitor; and, as if possessed by the perverse spirit of the girl, would only recall Jo’s oddities, faults, and freaks, would only show her in the most unsentimental aspects,—beating mats with her head tied up in a bandanna, barricading herself with the sofa-pillow, or throwing cold water over his passion à la Gummidge,—and an irresistible laugh spoilt the pensive picture he was endeavoring to paint. Jo wouldn’t be put into the Opera at any price, and he had to give her up with a “Bless that girl, what a torment she is!” and a clutch at his hair, as became a distracted composer.3
When he looked about him for another and a less intractable damsel to immortalize in melody, memory produced one with the most obliging readiness. This phantom wore many faces, but it always had golden hair, was enveloped in a diaphanous cloud, and floated airily before his mind’s eye in a pleasing chaos of roses, peacocks, white ponies and blue ribbons. He did not give the complaisant wraith any name, but he took her for his heroine, and grew quite fond of her, as well he might,—for he gifted her with every gift and grace under the sun, and escorted her, unscathed, through trials which would have annihilated any mortal woman.
Thanks to this inspiration, he got on swimmingly for a time, but gradually the work lost its charm, and he forgot to compose, while he sat musing, pen in hand, or roamed about the gay city to get new ideas and refresh his mind, which seemed to be in a somewhat unsettled state that winter. He did not do much, but he thought a great deal, and was conscious of a change of some sort going on in spite of himself. “It’s genius simmering, perhaps,—I’ll let it simmer, and see what comes of it,” he said, with a secret suspicion, all the while, that it wasn’t genius, but something far more common. Whatever it was, it simmered to some purpose, for he grew more and more discontented with his desultory life, began to long for some real and earnest work to go at, soul and body, and finally came to the wise conclusion that every one who loved music was not a composer. Returning from one of Mozart’s grand Operas, splendidly performed at the Royal Theatre
,4 he looked over his own, played a few of the best parts, sat staring up at the busts of Mendelssohn, Beethoven, and Bach, who stared benignly back again; then suddenly he tore up his music-sheets,5 one by one, and, as the last fluttered out of his hand, he said soberly, to himself,—
The Theater am Kärntnertor in Vienna. (Photo: akg-images)
“She is right! talent isn’t genius, and you can’t make it so. That music has taken the vanity out of me as Rome took it out of her, and I won’t be a humbug any longer. Now what shall I do?”
That seemed a hard question to answer, and Laurie began to wish he had to work for his daily bread.6 Now, if ever, occurred an eligible opportunity for “going to the devil,” as he once forcibly expressed it,—for he had plenty of money and nothing to do,—and Satan is proverbially fond of providing employment for full and idle hands. The poor fellow had temptations enough from without and from within, but he withstood them pretty well,—for much as he valued liberty he valued good faith and confidence more,—so his promise to his grandfather, and his desire to be able to look honestly into the eyes of the women who loved him, and say “All’s well,” kept him safe and steady.
Very likely some Mrs. Grundy will observe, “I don’t believe it; boys will be boys, young men must sow their wild oats, and women must not expect miracles.” I dare say you don’t, Mrs. Grundy, but it’s true, nevertheless. Women work a good many miracles, and I have a persuasion that they may perform even that of raising the standard of manhood by refusing to echo such sayings. Let the boys be boys,—the longer the better,—and let the young men sow their wild oats if they must,—but mothers, sisters, and friends may help to make the crop a small one, and keep many tares7 from spoiling the harvest, by believing,—and showing that they believe,—in the possibility of loyalty to the virtues which make men manliest in good women’s eyes. If it is a feminine delusion, leave us to enjoy it while we may,—for without it half the beauty and the romance of life is lost, and sorrowful forebodings would embitter all our hopes of the brave, tender-hearted little lads, who still love their mothers better than themselves, and are not ashamed to own it.