O blisful ordre, O wedlock precious, Thou art so mery, and so virtuous, And so commended, and approved eke, That every man that holt him worth a leke, Upon his bare knees oughten all his lif Thanken his G.o.d that him hath sent a wif; Or elles pray to G.o.d him for to send A wif to last until his lives end.

Chaucer.

Odious are town-weddings. To our fancy there is something appalling in the splendour with which the ceremony is invested. And it seems to defeat its object; for the festivities which follow the departure of the new-married pair are proverbially dull. But the train of carriages, the cloud of bride-maids, and all the rest of the pomp and parade, appear to us more fitted to gratify the taste of the mob on the pavement, than to show the refinement of the nineteenth century. A solemn rite is converted into a theatrical entertainment. What should be a scene of deep and heart-felt joy becomes a laborious piece of acting. The bridal wreath is sullied by the incense which rises round it. To be sure if there is no heart in the business, if the gist of the union is to be found in the settlements, and the promise to love, honour, and obey is made as a matter of form, then the scenic character of the accessaries is perhaps in keeping, and may serve to throw a decorous veil over the sacrifice. But the village-church is the proper shrine for matrimony.

The rustics who make a holiday of the occasion, and come in their Sunday raiment to take respectful leave of their squire's daughter, form a much more seemly retinue, than the gamins and idlers who throng the portico of the London church, staring with rude wonder, and eager for vulgar satire. And is it a childish desire that would fain invest the spot where our fondest hopes were crowned, with a little romance? May we not look forward to future pilgrimages to the altar where we were made the happiest of men? And who could dream of so revisiting St. George's? Nay, even the bells, inaudible in the metropolis, but in the country proclaiming our happiness, will thereby require a new charm in our ears, and their music will awake a new sympathy amidst its many dear and holy a.s.sociations.

There would, however, as the reader will readily suppose, be little or no display at the re-marriage of Randolph and Mildred. It was fixed to take place at the church belonging to the district in which Mrs.

Pendarrel resided. There at the appointed hour, the little party met; and the union, which was before furtive and irregular, received the sanction of Heaven at the hands of Polydore Riches. The ceremony was, perhaps, more impressive than usual, for more serious emotions accompanied its celebration. When it was over, the company returned through a gaping crowd to their carriages, and were driven home to May Fair. And from thence in no great time the bride and bridegroom, after many fond leave-takings, departed to travel by a circuitous route to Trevethlan Castle.

For it had been arranged that Helen, under the chaplain's safe-conduct, should precede them, and be ready to welcome her new sister to the old gray towers. And she carried with her a certain tender reminiscence; for when the time to part approached, Rereworth's love at last over-flowed.

A select circle of friends was a.s.sembled at Mrs. Pendarrel's to celebrate the event of the day. They were all strangers to Helen, and thus Seymour was able to appropriate her to himself. Even this little party was a novelty to her, and served to prolong the excitement caused by the ceremony of the morning. In the midst of a rapid and animated conversation, some allusion to the happiness of the married couple, which reached Seymour's ear, threw him completely off his guard.

"Happy!" he exclaimed. "Oh, dearest Miss Trevethlan, may not a like happiness be mine? May not I also--"

His voice sunk into a whisper, but his prayer was heard. And the ice being thus broken, Rereworth told hurriedly of all he desired, and he might read in Helen's flushed cheeks and downcast eyes, that he need not fear. He had accepted an invitation from Randolph to spend a portion of the ensuing long vacation at the castle, and then he flattered himself he might appear as Helen's recognised suitor.

In the afternoon Mr. Riches returned to his quarters at Hampstead, to spend his last night at the metropolis. Long was the session, which he held there with the old clerk. A hint had made Cornelius and his sister acquainted with the scene of the marriage, and they had been un.o.bserved, but not un.o.bservant, spectators of the ceremony. And for many a day after Polydore's departure, the two old bachelors maintained a constant correspondence, in which they discussed the merits of old essayists, and criticised the beauties of old plays. Sister Clotilda and her brother never seemed to grow older than they were when Randolph and Helen dwelt beneath their roof. Sometimes their old lodger invited them through the chaplain to make a tour to Trevethlan Castle, promising to shew them all the wonders of the land. But Cornelius, though he did not appear to age, grew more and more fond of the flags of the metropolis, and could not be prevailed upon to attempt so long an excursion. "I am no traveller," he once wrote to Mr. Riches. "Twenty or twenty-five miles of nice quiet road, with green hedges and comfortable inns, a cow or two here and there, and now and then a pig, that is all the country I like. London is my pleasure. I affect a bit of enthusiasm to strangers about this village of Hampstead, but I should like it better without the hill." And so peace and farewell to the peachery.

The arrival of Helen and the chaplain occasioned much rejoicing in the hamlet of Trevethlan, but the main demonstration was of course reserved for the coming of the young squire and his bride. And a proud day it was for old Jeffrey, when their carriage dashed over the green amidst the cheers of the villagers, and he finally hoisted the family flag to the top of its staff.

There was firing and feasting, and dancing, in the hamlet and the castle; the great hall was thrown open to all comers, and the rivalry between Trevethlan and Pendarrel was drowned in flowing bowls, and forgotten in the unions of the mazy measure. And night had long hung her pall over the sea, before silence reigned in the towers on the cliff.

And here, perhaps, we might drop the curtain. But the reader will not be displeased at a rapid glance over some of the years which have elapsed since that happy day. The tranquillity which succeeded to the first exuberance of joyousness, was not unchequered with feelings of a more pensive cast.

The hamlet, indeed, throve under the renewed splendour of the castle.

Mrs. Miniver removed the boards from the windows in the wings of the hostelry, and re-opened the rooms which had so long been closed. Nay, she was no longer Mrs. Miniver, having submitted to the change at which farmer Colan had hinted, and taken unto herself a husband. Edward Owen was the fortunate man. True, he was a dozen or fifteen years younger than his buxom bride, but she was more youthful in spirit than in age.

The match seemed to turn out as comfortably as either party could desire. It is probable that the lady retained possession of her bunch of keys.

His old sweetheart, Mercy, was not to be tempted into wedlock. Helen renewed her confidence with the fair rustic, and introduced her to Mildred. But she never forgot her unworthy lover. She scarcely believed he was lost to her forever; but sometimes felt a transient fear that, in a foreign land, he might have found the fate predicted for him by the old sibyl of St. Madron's Well. But no intelligence ever arrived, either to confirm or to contradict the maiden's apprehensions.

Mildred had been only a very short time at the castle when she was introduced to Merlin's Cave. We cannot close our labours without reverting for a moment to the grotto, which possessed so many a.s.sociations for Randolph and Helen. Few of our readers, we would believe, will not, at some period of their lives, have had a Merlin's Cave of their own. Seated under the little canopy of rock, the young bride learned the traditional ballad of her new home, and trusted that it might never again be applicable to the fortunes of the family. There too she became acquainted with the black-letter lore, which of old was the delight of her husband and sister; and there in long detail she heard the story of their early ambition. On Mid-summer eve they all repaired thither to witness the lighting of St. John's fires. Then as the shades of evening fell over the sea, long streams of radiance rose into the sky from all the numerous villages surrounding the beautiful bay. From Carn Dew over Lamorna Cove all round to Cudden Point, the landscape sparkled with the festive bonfires. The spectators might hear the sounds of distant revelry borne from afar over the waters, and echoed more loudly from the green of their own hamlet.

At the trial of the prisoners charged with the incendiarism at Pendarrel, it was suggested, in their defence, that the fire was occasioned by the lightning. Gabriel Denis kept his own counsel. And the doubt so raised, combined with certain powerful intercession, availed to mitigate the extreme penalties of the law. Of the criminals, some were transported for various terms, and others imprisoned. Gabriel's little girl was brought up at Trevethlan Castle, and caused no small trouble, with her hot Spanish blood. But it was endured, in remembrance of the confession of the witness, Wyley.

The long vacation brought Rereworth to the castle, and few days had pa.s.sed when he communicated to Randolph, Helen's sanction of his dearest aspirations. And the brother rejoiced at the news, and warmly congratulated both himself and his friend. Seymour thought himself fortunate in obtaining a house, with pleasant grounds attached, in the neighbourhood where he had first met the lady of his love; and thither, in the s.p.a.ce of a few months, he had the joy of conducting her as his bride. And Helen cordially accepted her new abode, shared her husband's hopes, and encouraged his professional ambition. She might be unable to repress an occasional regret for the land of her infancy, childhood, and youth, but the feeling was never visible in the company of her friend, lover, and husband.

Some years elapsed before Mrs. Pendarrel revisited the country of her ancestors. She was content to see Mildred and Randolph, when they came to stay a while with the Winstons or Rereworths, which they did every spring. She had subsided into a moping kind of melancholy, which annoyed her husband and grieved her children. The only circ.u.mstance which ever seemed to dissipate it was the growing good understanding between Gertrude and Mr. Winston. This appeared to remove some of the weight which oppressed her mind. And it showed, that if those who are cast together by accident, or even against their will, will study one another's merits, instead of seeking for faults and dwelling on discomforts, happiness may be found in circ.u.mstances where least it might be expected beforehand. It was a lesson which Gertrude learned with a thankful heart.

The visits of the spring were returned in the autumnal holidays, when a joyous throng of young people met regularly, in the course of time, at Trevethlan Castle. Holidays they were indeed. The Rereworths were always there, and most often the Winstons. Then the base court resounded with the glee of children, with a confusion of tongues and of names worthy of Babel. Griffith, declining gently into the vale of years, presided over the gambols. Sometimes the ancient sport of archery, the loss of which is so much deplored by Cornwall's old surveyor, Carew, was revived, and all the neighbouring country met to try their skill at the b.u.t.ts; while the little ones, escaping from the mild dominion of Polydore Riches, who was now, in green old age, the teacher of a new generation, mimicked the proceedings of their seniors, with bows and arrows suited to their years.

Pendarrel Hall remained a ruin. The estate was settled upon Mildred and her husband, and it seemed unnecessary to maintain two large residences upon the united property. The flower-garden surrounding it was allowed to run to waste, and the blackened walls continued standing, mournful memorials of an outrage which had exiled several of its perpetrators from their native land. Ivy was planted around the foundations, and at some future day, the ruin might become a picturesque feature in the landscape.

It was the doom which its mistress, in the opening of this narrative, antic.i.p.ated for the towers of Trevethlan. The menace or the desire had been deeply avenged. But Esther was not the only person upon whom the storm left traces of its pa.s.sage. Mildred was often visited with feelings of compunction and remorse, and the cloud which they brought upon her brow called down a similar shadow upon Randolph's. And when her mother survived Mr. Pendarrel, and in her loneliness accepted the shelter of Trevethlan Castle, her aspect and demeanour were a constant source of self-reproach to her daughter. Without being actually imbecile, she required minute attention. She was very rigid and exacting in all the little business of life. Her temper was uncertain, and it was difficult to gratify her fleeting wishes. At times it might be thought that she remembered how she should have been mistress of the castle, and imagined for a brief s.p.a.ce that she in fact occupied that position.

Frequently, too, she fell into long and silent reveries, and then it was that the melancholy which overspread her countenance, caused the greatest anxiety to her children. She always wore the miniature of herself, and used to gaze at it, with a vacant but mournful expression, for an hour at a time. But at length they found a means of diverting her attention. She attached herself particularly to her eldest grand-daughter; and whenever she sank into too prolonged a train of musing, the little girl crept softly to her knees, and took her hand.

And then Esther awoke from her dream of the past, and smoothed the dark hair upon the child's forehead, and told many little stories, which delighted the young listener.

Rarely did it happen that this manner of relief failed of effect. But sometimes Esther's abstraction was too deep to yield. At such seasons she murmured to herself in low tones. And the little girl caused her mother a bitter pang, by unwittingly telling her that, on one of these occasions, grandmamma was only repeating, over and over again, and without intermission--

"Pendar'l and Trevethlan shall own one name."

THE END.