Were they united, to be yet again
Disparted, pitiable lot! But here
A portion of the tale may well be left
In silence, though my memory could add
Much how the Youth, in scanty space of time,
Was traversed from without; much, too, of thoughts
That occupied his days in solitude,
Under privation and restraint; and what,
Through dark and shapeless fear of things to come, And what, through strong compunction for the past, He suffered, breaking down in heart and mind!
Doomed to a third and last captivity,
His freedom he recovered on the eve
When the babe was born, Its presence tempted him to cherish schemes
Julia," said he, "and to your father's house
Go with the child. You have been wretched; yet
The silver shower, whose reckless burden weighs Too heavily upon the lily's head,
Oft leaves a saving moisture at its root.
Malice, beholding you, will melt away.
Go!'t is a town where both of us were born; None will reproach you, for our truth is known; And if, amid those once-bright bowers, our fate Remain unpitied, pity is not in man.
Till no one can resist him. Now, even now,
I see him sporting on the sunny lawn;
My father from the window sees him too;
Startled, as if some new-created thing
Enriched the earth, or Faery of the woods
Bounded before him; but the unweeting Child
Shall by his beauty win his grandsire's heart
So that it shall be softened, and our loves
End happily, as they began!"
Appeared but seldom; oftener was he seen
Propping a pale and melancholy face
Upon the Mother's bosom; resting thus
His head upon one breast, while from the other
The Babe was drawing in its quiet food.
-That pillow is no longer to be thine,
Fond Youth! that mournful solace now must pass
Into the list of things that cannot be!
Unwedded Julia, terror-smitten, hears
The sentence, by her mother's lip pronounced,
That dooms her to a convent. Who shall tell,
Who dares report, the tidings to the lord
Of her affections? So they blindly asked,
Who knew not to what quiet depths a weight
Of agony had pressed the Sufferer down:
The word, by others dreaded, he can hear
Composed and silent, without visible sign
Of even the least emotion. Noting this,
When the impatient object of his love
Upbraided him with slackness, he returned
No answer, only took the mother's hand
And kissed it; seemingly devoid of Jain,
Or care, that what so tenderly he pressed
Was a dependent on the obdurate heart
Of one who came to disunite their lives
For ever,
sad alternative! preferred,
By the unbending parents of the Maid,
To secret 'spousals meanly disavowed.
In the city he remained
A season after Julia had withdrawn
To those religious walls. He, too, departs; -
Who with him? even the senseless Little-one.
With that sole charge he passed the city-gates,
For the last time, attendant by the side
Of a close chair, a litter, or sedan,
In which the Babe was carried. To a hill,
That rose a brief league distant from the town,
The dwellers in that house where he had lodged
Accompanied his steps, by anxious love
Impelled; - they parted from him there, and
Watching below, till he had disappeared
On the hill-top. His eyes he scarcely took,
Throughout that journey, from the vehicle
(Slow-moving ark of all his hopes!) that veiled
The tender infant and at every inn,
And under every hospitable tree
At which the bearers halted or reposed,
Laid him with timid care upon his knees,
And looked, as mothers ne'er were known to look, Upon the nurstling which his arms embraced.
This was the manner in which Vaudracour
Departed with his infant; and thus reached
His father's house, where to the innocent child
Admittance was denied. The young man spake
No word of indignation or reproof,
But of his father begged, a last request,
That a retreat might be assigned to him
Where in forgotten quiet he might dwell,
With such allowance as his wants required;
For wishes he had none. To a lodge
To a lodge that stood
Deep in a forest, with leave given, at the age
Of four-and-twenty summers he withdrew ;
And thither took with him his motherless Babe,
And one domestic for their common needs,
An aged woman. It consoled him here
To attend upon the orphan, and perform
Obsequious service to the precious child,
Which, after a short time, by some mistake
Or indiscretion of the Father, died.
The Tale I follow to its last recess
Of suffering or of peace, I know not which:
Theirs be the blame who caused the woe, not
From this time forth he never shared a smile With mortal creature. An inhabitant
Of that same town, in which the pair had left
So lively a remembrance of their griefs,
By chance of business coming within reach
Of his retirement, to the forest lodge
Repaired, but only found the matron there,
Who told him that his pains were thrown away, For that her master never uttered word
· Behold! While they were speaking, Vaudracour approached; But, seeing some one near, as on the latch
Of the garden-gate his hand was laid, he shrunk, -
And, like a shadow, glided out of view.
Shocked at his savage aspect, from the place
The visitor retired.
Thus lived the Youth,
Cut off from all intelligence with man,
And shunning even the light of common day; Nor could the voice of Freedom, which through France
Full speedily resounded, public hope,
Or personal memory of his own deep wrongs,
Rouse him but in those solitary shades
His days he wasted, an imbecile mind!
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