The mother was kneeling by the window, with her face concealed in the folds of the cur tain. She arose, and, going to the bedside of her child, threw her arms around her and burst into tears.
“My dear mother, I shall not live long; I feel it here. This piercing pain, — at times it seizes me, and I cannot — cannot breathe.”
“My child, you will be better soon.”
“Yes, mother, I shall be better soon. All tears, and pain, and sorrow will be over. The hymn of adoration and entreaty I have just heard, I shall never hear again on earth. Next Sabbath, mother, kneel again by that window as to-day. I shall not be here, upon this bed of pain and sickness; but when you hear the solemn hymn of worship, and the beseeching tones that wing the spirit up to God, think, mother, that I am there, with my sweet sister who has gone before us, — kneeling at our Saviour’s feet, and happy, — O, how happy!”
The afflicted mother made no reply, — her heart was too full to speak.
“You remember, mother, how calmly Amie died. She was so young and beautiful! I always pray that I may die as she did. I do not fear death as I did before she was taken from us. But, O, — this pain, — this cruel pain! — it seems to draw my mind back from heaven. When it leaves me, I shall die in peace.”
“My poor child! God’s holy will be done!”
The invalid soon sank into a quiet slumber. The excitement was over, and exhausted nature sought relief in sleep.
The persons between whom this scene passed were a widow and her sick daughter, from the neighbourhood of Tours. They had left the banks of the Loire to consult the more experienced physicians of the metropolis, and had been directed to the maison de santé at Auteuil for the benefit of the pure air. But all in vain. The health of the uncomplaining patient grew worse and worse, and it soon became evident that the closing scene was drawing near.
Of this Jacqueline herself seemed conscious; and towards evening she expressed a wish to receive the last sacraments of the church. A priest was sent for; and ere long the tinkling of a little bell in the street announced his approach. He bore in his hand a silver chalice containing the consecrated wafer, and a small vessel filled with the holy oil of the extreme unction hung from his neck. Before him walked a boy carrying a little bell, whose sound announced the passing of these symbols of the Catholic faith. In the rear, a few of the villagers, bearing lighted wax tapers, formed a short and melancholy procession. They soon entered the sick-chamber, and the glimmer of the tapers mingled with the red light of the setting sun that shot his farewell rays through the open window. The vessel of oil and the silver chalice were placed upon the table in front of a crucifix that hung upon the wall, and all present, excepting the priest, threw themselves upon their knees. The priest then approached the bed of the dying girl, and said, in a slow and solemn tone, —
“The King of kings and Lord of lords has passed thy threshold. Is thy spirit ready to receive him?”
“It is, father.”
“Hast thou confessed thy sins?”
“Holy father, no.”
“Confess thyself, then, that thy sins may be forgiven, and thy name recorded in the book of life.”
And, turning to the kneeling crowd around, he waved his hand for them to retire, and was left alone with the sick girl. He seated himself beside her pillow, and the subdued whisper of the confession mingled with the murmur of the evening air, which lifted the heavy folds of the curtains, and stole in upon the holy scene. Poor Jacqueline had few sins to confess, — a secret thought or two towards the pleasures and delights of the world, — a wish to live, unuttered, but which, to the eye of her self-accusing spirit, seemed to resist the wise providence of God; — no more. The confession of a meek and lowly heart is soon made. The door was again opened; the attendants entered, and knelt around the bed, and the priest proceeded, —
“And now prepare thyself to receive with contrite heart the body of our blessed Lord and Redeemer. Dost thou believe that our Lord Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary?”
“I believe.”
And all present joined in the solemn response,— “I believe.”
“Dost thou believe that the Father is God, that the Son is God, and that the Holy Spirit is God, — three persons and one God?”
“I believe.”
“Dost thou believe that the Son is seated on the right hand of the Majesty on high, whence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead?”
“I believe.”
“Dost thou believe that by the holy sacraments of the church thy sins are forgiven thee, and that thus thou art made worthy of eternal life?”
“I believe.”
“Dost thou pardon, with all thy heart, all who have offended thee in thought, word, or deed?”
“I pardon them.”
“And dost thou ask pardon of God and thy neighbour for all offences thou hast committed against them, either in thought, word, or deed?”
“I do!”
“Then repeat after me, — O Lord Jesus, I am not worthy, nor do I merit, that thy divine majesty should enter this poor tenement of clay; but, according to thy holy promises, be my sins forgiven, and my soul washed white from all transgression.”
Then, taking a consecrated wafer from the vase, he placed it between the lips of the dying girl, and, while the assistant sounded the little silver bell, said, —
“Corpus Domini nostri Jesu Christi custodiat animam tuam in vitam eternam And the kneeling crowd smote their breasts and responded in one solemn voice,—” Amen!”
The priest then took a little golden rod, and, dipping it in holy oil, anointed the invalid upon the hands, feet, and breast, in the form of the cross. When these ceremonies were completed, the priest and his attendants retired, leaving the mother alone with her dying child, who, from the exhaustion caused by the preceding scene, sank into a deathlike sleep.
“Between two worlds life hovered like a star, ‘Twixt night and morn, upon the horizon’s verge.”
The long twilight of the summer evening stole on; the shadows deepened without, and the night-lamp glimmered feebly in the sick-chamber; but still she slept. She was lying with her hands clasped upon her breast, — her pallid cheek resting upon the pillow, and her bloodless lips apart, but motionless and silent as the sleep of death. Not a breath interrupted the silence of her slumber. Not a movement of the heavy and sunken eyelid, not a trembling of the lip, not a shadow on the marble brow, told when the spirit took its flight. It passed to a better world than this: —
“There ‘s a perpetual spring, — perpetual youth;
No joint-benumbing cold, nor scorching heat,
Famine, nor age, have any being there.”
THE SEXAGENARIAN.
Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth, that are written down old, with all the characters of age? Have you not a moist eye, a dry hand, a yellow cheek, a white beard, a decreasing leg?
SHAKSPEARE.
THERE he goes, in his long russet surtout, sweeping down yonder gravel-walk, beneath the trees, like a yellow leaf in autumn wafted along by a fitful gust of wind. Now he pauses, — now seems to be whirled round in an eddy, — and now rustles and brushes onward again. He is talking to himself in an under-tone, as usual, and flourishes a pinch of snuff between his forefinger and his thumb, ever and anon drumming on the cover of his box, by way of emphasis, with a sound like the tap of a woodpecker. He always takes a morning walk in the garden, — in fact, I may say he passes the greater part of the day there, either strolling up and down the gravel-walks, or sitting on a rustic bench in one of the leafy arbours. He always wears that same dress, too; a bell-crowned hat, a frilled bosom, and white dimity vest, soiled with snuff, — light nankeen breeches, and, over all, that long and flowing surtout of russet-brown Circassian, hanging in wrinkles round his slender body, and toying with his thin, rakish legs. Such is his constant garb, morning and evening; and it gives him a cool and breezy look, even in the heat of a noonday in A
ugust.
The personage sketched in the preceding paragraph is Monsieur D’Argentville, a sexagenarian, with whom I became acquainted during my residence at the maison de santé of Auteuil. I found him there, and left him there. Nobody knew when he came, — he had been there from time immemorial; nor when he was going away, — for he himself did not know; nor what ailed him, — for though he was always complaining, yet he grew neither better nor worse, never consulted the physician, and ate voraciously three times a day. At table he was rather peevish, troubled his neighbours with his elbows, and uttered the monosyllable pish! rather oftener than good-breeding and a due deference to the opinions of others seemed to justify. As soon as he seated himself at table, he breathed into his tumbler, and wiped it out with a napkin; then wiped his plate, his spoon, his knife and fork in succession, and each with great care. After this he placed the napkin under his chin; and, these preparations being completed, gave full swing to an appetite which was not inappropriately denominated, by one of our guests, “une faim canine.”
The old gentleman’s weak side was an affectation of youth and gallantry. Though “written down old, with all the characters of age,” yet at times he seemed to think himself in the heyday of life; and the assiduous court he paid to a fair countess, who was passing the summer at the maison de santé, was the source of no little merriment to all but himself. He loved, too, to recall the golden age of his amours; and would discourse with prolix eloquence, and a faint twinkle in his watery eye, of his bonnes fortunes in times of old, and the rigors that many a fair dame had suffered on his account. Indeed, his chief pride seemed to be to make his hearers believe that he had been a dangerous man in his youth, and was not yet quite safe.
As I also was a peripatetic of the garden, we encountered each other at every turn. At first our conversation was limited to the usual salutations of the day; but ere long our casual acquaintance ripened into a kind of intimacy. Step by step I won my way, — first into his society, — then into his snuff-box, — and then into his heart. He was a great talker, and he found in me what he found in no other inmate of the house, — a good listener, who never interrupted his long stories, nor contradicted his opinions. So he talked down one alley and up another, — from breakfast till dinner, — from dinner till midnight, — at all times and in all places, when he could catch me by the button, till at last he had confided to my ear all the important and unimportant events of a life of sixty years.
Monsieur D’Argentville was a shoot from a wealthy family of Nantes. Just before the Revolution, he went up to Paris to study law at the University, and, like many other wealthy scholars of his age, was soon involved in the intrigues and dissipation of the metropolis. He first established himself in the Rue de l’Université; but a roguish pair of eyes at an opposite window soon drove from the field such heavy tacticians as Hugues Doneau and Gui Coquille.
A flirtation was commenced in due form; and a flag of truce, offering to capitulate, was sent in the shape of a billet-doux. In the mean time he regularly amused his leisure hours by blowing kisses across the street with an old pair of bellows. One afternoon, as he was occupied in this way, a tall gentleman with whiskers stepped into the room, just as he had charged the bellows to the muzzle. He muttered something about an explanation, — his sister, — marriage, — and the satisfaction of a gentleman! Perhaps there is no situation in life so awkward to a man of real sensibility as that of being awed into matrimony or a duel by the whiskers of a tall brother. There was but one alternative; and the next morning a placard at the window of the Bachelor of Love, with the words “Furnished Apartment to let,” showed that the former occupant had found it convenient to change lodgings.
He next appeared in the Chaussée-d’Antin, where he assiduously prepared himself for future exigencies by a course of daily lessons in the use of the small-sword. He soon after quarrelled with his best friend, about a little actress on ‘the Boulevard, and had the satisfaction of being jilted, and then run through the body at the Bois de Boulogne. This gave him new-eclat in the fashionable world, and consequently he pursued pleasure with a keener relish than ever. He next had the grande passion, and narrowly escaped marrying an heiress of great expectations, and a countless number of chateaux. Just before the catastrophe, however, he had the good fortune to discover that the lady’s expectations were limited to his own pocket, and that, as for her châteaux, they were all Chateaux en Espagne.
About this time his father died; and the hopeful son was hardly well established in his inheritance, when the Revolution broke out. Unfortunately, he was a firm upholder of the divine right of kings, and had the honor of being among the first of the proscribed. He narrowly escaped the guillotine by jumping on board a vessel bound for America, and arrived at Boston with only a few francs in his pocket; but, as he knew how to accommodate himself to circumstances, he continued to live by teaching fencing and French, and keeping a dancing-school and a milliner.
At the restoration of the Bourbons, he returned to France; and from that time to the day of our acquaintance had been engaged in a series of vexatious lawsuits, in the hope of recovering a portion of his property, which had been intrusted to a friend for safe keeping at the commencement of the Revolution. His friend, however, denied all knowledge of the transaction, and the assignment was very difficult to prove. Twelve years of unsuccessful litigation had completely soured the old gentleman’s temper, and made him peevish and misanthropic; and he had come to Auteuil merely to escape the noise of the city, and to brace his shattered nerves with pure air and quiet amusements. There he idled the time away, sauntering about the garden of the maison de santé, talking to himself when he could get no other listener, and occasionally reinforcing his misanthropy with a dose of the Maxims of La Rochefoucauld, or a visit to the scene of his duel in the Bois de Boulogne.
Poor Monsieur d’Argentville! What a miserable life he led, — or rather dragged on, from day to day! A petulant, broken-down old man, who had outlived his fortune, and his friends, and his hopes, — yea, every thing but the sting of bad passions and the recollection of a life ill-spent! Whether he still walks the earth or slumbers in its bosom, I know not; but a lively recollection of him will always mingle with my reminiscences of Auteuil.
PÈRE LA CHAISE.
Our fathers find their graves in our short memories, and sadly tell us how we may be buried in our survivors.
Oblivion is not to be hired. The greater part must be content to be as though they had not been, — to be found in the register of God, not in the record of man.
SIR THOMAS BROWN’S URN BURIAL.
THE cemetery of Père la Chaise is the Westminster Abbey of Paris. Both are the dwellings of the dead; but in one they repose in green alleys and beneath the open sky, — in the other their resting-place is in the shadowy aisle, and beneath the dim arches of an ancient abbey. One is a temple of nature; the other a temple of art. In one, the soft melancholy of the scene is rendered still more touching by the warble of birds and the shade of trees, and the grave receives the gentle visit of the sunshine and the shower: in the other, no sound but the passing footfall breaks the silence of the place; the twilight steals in through high and dusky windows; and the damps of the gloomy vault lie heavy on the heart, and leave their stain upon the mouldering tracery of the tomb.
Père la Chaise stands just beyond the Barrière d’Aulney, on a hill-side, looking towards the city. Numerous gravel-walks, winding through shady avenues and between marble monuments, lead up from the principal entrance to a chapel on the summit. There is hardly a grave that has not its little inclosure planted with shrubbery; and a thick mass of foliage half conceals each funeral stone. The sighing of the wind, as the branches rise and fall upon it, — the occasional note of a bird among the trees, and the shifting of light and shade upon the tombs beneath, have a soothing effect upon the mind; and I doubt whether any one can enter that jnclosure, where repose the dust and ashes of so many great and good men, without feeling the religion of the pl
ace steal over him, and seeing something of the dark and gloomy expression pass off from the stern countenance of death.
It was near the close of a bright summer afternoon that I visited this celebrated spot for the first time. The first object that arrested my attention, on entering, was a monument in the form of a small Gothic chapel, which stands near the entrance, in the avenue leading to the right hand. On the marble couch within are stretched two figures, carved in stone and dressed in the antique garb of the Middle Ages. It is the tomb of Abélard and Héloïse. The history of these unfortunate lovers is too well known to need recapitulation; but perhaps it is not so well known how often their ashes were disturbed in the slumber of the grave. Abélard died in the monastery of Saint Marcel, and was buried in the vaults of the church. His body was afterward removed to the convent of the Paraclet, at the request of Héloïse, and at her death her body was deposited in the same tomb. Three centuries they reposed together; after which they were separated to different sides of the church, to calm the delicate scruples of the lady-abbess of the convent. More than a century afterward, they were again united in the same tomb; and when at length the Paraclet was destroyed, their mouldering remains were transported to the church of Nogent-sur-Seine. They were next deposited in an ancient cloister at Paris; and now repose near the gateway of the cemetery of Père la Chaise. What a singular destiny was theirs! that, after a life of such passionate and disastrous love, — such sorrows, and tears, and penitence, — their very dust should not be suffered to rest quietly in the grave! — that their death should so much resemble their life in its changes and vicissitudes, its partings and its meetings, its inquietudes and its persecutions! — that mistaken zeal should follow them down to the very tomb, — as if earthly passion could glimmer, like a funeral lamp, amid the damps of the charnel-house, and “even in their ashes burn their wonted fires!”
Delphi Complete Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (Delphi Poets Series Book 13) Page 186
