Delphi Complete Works of William Godwin 1st ed. (2022), page 265
part #1 of Delphi Classics Series
CHAPTER VII
MY JOURNEY WAS brought to a close for the present at the village of Harrowgate in Yorkshire, a spot frequented in certain seasons of the year for the imputed virtues of its spa, and of which the air is incontestibly salubrious and invigorating. A residence in this place I was assured would be considerably beneficial to me; and the society was easy; every one without remark mixing in it as much or as little as he pleased.
The scene on the whole was highly agreeable to me. The health of the human frame may be considered as a negative attribute, of which we have in a manner no feeling at those times when we most unequivocally possess it. It is only by comparison that we are enabled to apprehend its value. For myself, I had been so long in a state of deadness and languor, that the simplest enjoyments came to me like the dawn of a new life. The flowers never smelled so sweet, the skies never looked with so celestial a blue; the song of the birds, and the murmur of the waters supplied to me a ravishing gratification. The joy was however short; I soon became exhausted; and then sunk into no unpleasing listlessness. I often fell asleep in the shade, the breezes of heaven playing on my cheek; and my dreams were then all of soft and unexhausted pleasure; the cup no longer overflowing, but the savour and the sense remaining. The very frame and articulations of my body were like a new possession to me; I was agreeably surprised to find my limbs move easily and without pain, and that I once more engrossed in no contemptible proportion the attributes of a human being.
Among the persons I encountered at Harrowgate there was one that particularly engaged my attention. This was a young lady of the name of Margaret Borradale. She was of a slight figure, but exquisitely delicate and beautiful. When I met her, she was about three-and-twenty years of age. I was already forty-two. I was told that she had been of a fine complexion, in which the roses and the lilies vied with each other. But the roses were now all faded. Her skin was as fair and as smooth as marble. There was a melancholy in her countenance, the most interesting that can be imagined. Her eyes had entirely lost the light of youth; and she seemed scarcely to notice the things around her.
She was at Harrowgate accompanied by her parents. She went into society, because they desired it; but her thoughts were not in the places where she was corporeally present. Her air was disconsolate and neglected. She spoke occasionally; she sung; she danced. The melody of her tones was inconceivably touching; her dancing was characterised with a pathetic languor. Those who had been acquainted with her before, described her as the ghost only of the resplendent being they had formerly known; but the ghost presented to you, though in a faint and half-obliterated outline, the image of something inexpressibly engaging. Fancy unavoidably went on to fill out the picture; and the spectator perhaps admired it the more, because it was in some measure his own creation, melting into thin air when the enthusiasm with which you contemplated it was turned away and gone. She was a being not of this world; she was a monumental statue personating the thing that had been; she was like those creatures we read of in the fairy tales, touched by the wand of a malignant enchanter, condemned never again to mix in the realities of life, but still retaining a portion, however incomplete, of vitality and sense, still mournful and sad, and destined never to rise again into interest and energy and hope.
Her story was a sad one. She had been crossed in love. Her father had been a younger brother. He had married imprudently; and he had brought up his daughter in great retirement, and in a way little calculated to stir up in her ambitious thoughts. They lived on an income of a few hundreds a year. Their residence was among villagers; and the first hints of youthful affection were awakened in her bosom towards a stripling of her own age, who resided at a short distance from her father’s dwelling, named William. He was the only son of his mother. He had been some years absent under the care of an uncle; but, upon the death of his father, a simple farmer, in the occupation of two hundred acres of land, he was recalled to the parental roof, that he might be the stay, the comforter and assistant of her who bore him. He was eighteen, a blooming youth, with active limbs, dark-brown, curling hair, and a heart, the softest and gentlest that ever dwelt in a human bosom. His uncle had been the member of a college, and William had gained a larger range of ideas, and much intellectual improvement, while he lived under the guidance of this relative.
Had he been uninterruptedly the neighbour of Margaret, they would neither of them perhaps have been so much struck with the other. But, as it was, their feelings were those of ancient neighbourhood, combined with the novelty that is peculiar to love at first sight. They had been playfellows; and they felt the confidence and familiarity which that relation, when connected with agreeable qualities and accordant dispositions, seldom fails to produce. And yet, meeting, as they now did, after years of separation, neither of them could think the other the same being as at the period at which they parted. Their former familiarity had been that of children, without apprehension, without consciousness, the mere exuberance of youthful spirits, void of all feeling of sex, except as the party more robust of muscle and limb is instinctively delicate in his treatment of the frailer flower, and as the female, with an obscure and undefined anticipation of the scenes of after-life, occasionally practises a few coquettries, or imposes a task on her more athletic associate, or ridicules his awkwardnesses, or laughs him out of some fit of unseasonable gravity.
But now, in the renewed acquaintance of the two, they each felt that they were entering upon a more important scene of existence. They did not suppose, as is frequently the case in the buoyant and idler hours of youth, that each day was a duration by itself, cut off from all that had preceded or might follow, and that what was done in each successive period involved no consequences, and imparted no colour of its own to what was to come. They felt that life was a serious affair, that whatever they did had a responsibility attached to it, and might mark for good or for evil the character or fortune of the party that acted, or the party that was the object of what was done. They looked into it therefore with a keener eye and a more awakened mind. Their apprehension was alive. Sometimes they blushed; sometimes their speech faltered and was broken; and sometimes, even when they smiled, or laughed outright with unrestrained gaiety, there was more passed on one side or the other, than any external indications gave expression to.
William and Margaret were the same as they had been in the early years of their acquaintance. They were the same; and yet how different! The comparison was as between the rosebud, and the flower still young, fresh and untarnished, but arrayed with all the glory that nature out of her inexhausted storehouse is accustomed to bestow. It was in the manner of the metamorphoses of the ancient mythology. If narrowly examined, you detected the identity; the elements were what they had previously been. But, oh, how resplendent was the form which now presented itself! There was the same sweetness of disposition, ever accommodating officious and complying, the same frankness, the same generosity, the same warmth of spirit and congeniality of soul; but how expanded, how assured, how full of tender heart and pregnant meaning!
As they dwelt near each other, they encountered every day, perhaps several times in a day. The unrestrained intercourse in which they lived, had however, one singular effect. That which might be done at any time, still remained undone. They in fact scarcely adverted to the situation in which they were mutually placed. They were lost a thousand fathoms deep in love, before they knew that they loved. They were happy in each other’s presence; they were uneasy and restless in absence. They dwelt on each other’s voice; they repeated each other’s words; their dreams had but one subject; the principal person in those wild plots which make the story of our sleeping hours, was still the same. If they read, they each imagined the other to be at hand, and did not so much consider how the reflections and paintings of the author affected themselves, as how they would be received by the other. Their union of hearts was like a deep, pellucid stream, which, flowing over an even bed, and meeting with no interruption, passed on unnoticed; while the same stream, if opposed, or on uneven ground, leaping from rock to rock, would shew that it was omnipotent, and that no power on earth had strength to arrest its progress. They talked of every thing out of themselves; the beauties of nature, the beauties of literature, the irregularities of climate, the change of the seasons, the flowers, the crops, the animals. They were both botanists; both delighted to observe the various habits and instincts of the animal creation. They were both fond of music. They sometimes sang in concert, and at other times called in the aid of the instrumental to give variety and copiousness to the natural music of the voice. William became the instructor of Margaret, a little in language, more in science and matters of literary taste; and it is well known how critical the relation of tutor and pupil often becomes between persons of opposite sexes, when both are just advanced on the threshold of life.
It is indeed specially characteristic of the passion of love, that it has the faculty of giving a perpetual flow to the interchange of sentiments and reflections in conversation. The parties feel no reserve with each other; they are eager to communicate every thing that is new; no remark seems insignificant; and every thing that is said is sure to experience a favourable reception. They learn more and more to think alike; and it is scarcely in human nature that we should feel weariness or disgust in hearing our own sentiments articulated by the lips of our companion. This is a genuine and natural echo, that will be listened to for ever. Between lovers the modulations of the voice are always delightful in the one who speaks to the one who hears; and the expressive varieties of the countenance, the gesticulations of sentiment, of gaiety, of tenderness, of disapprobation, of light-heartedness and frolic mirth, afford endless occasions of observation and interest.
CHAPTER VIII
IN THIS MANNER the days of these lovers, for such they were, glided on in an Elysian tranquillity, till a mere accident had the effect of producing a striking change in their situation. The mother of William had been absent for several weeks, on a visit to a friend who dwelt at a distance of one hundred and fifty miles. William, as I have already said, was the stay, the comforter and assistant of her who bore him, and had been recalled to her side by the decease of his father. He amply supplied to her the place of the protector she had lost. He had always been remarked for his duty as a child; and now, that his mother had no other domestic friend, he had greatly increased in his assiduity and affection towards her. They were all the world to each other, with no considerable exception, unless the embryo and unexplained passion he entertained for Margaret. The time was come when he expected his mother to return; the day of her arrival was fixed; and William was to proceed some miles upon the road, to meet her and escort her home. The hour of meeting drew nigh; and the youth had already gone to the stable, and was about to harness his horse to the simple vehicle, in which he was accustomed to accompany his mother in her little recreations, when a messenger arrived with a letter, informing him that an unexpected circumstance had occurred, which would oblige her to defer her return from the Wednesday to the Saturday following.
In the little ménage of the widow’s house, the absence of the mistress was of course strongly felt: she and her son had been accustomed to sit down with no other companion to their simple board. He had felt his late solitary state as a privation; he had counted upon the return of his mother as upon one of the bright days in his calendar. He had taken care to have the house ‘swept and garnished’ in the way that he knew would please her best. He had the garden put in the exactest order, and a few vases containing those productions of Flora which were her special favourites, ranged in the window. He had begun to watch the weather, and to count the hours. He called over the little events of the house and the homestead, which he was sure it would gratify her to hear, and eagerly anticipated the pleasure it would give him to encounter her well-known and much-loved features, and to light up the smile of maternal approbation in her venerated countenance. It therefore struck a damp upon him, to have this near approaching delight deferred even for three days. He murmured. He felt that all the mighty store of his affection and attachment had been waked up, and brought into unusual activity, to be now repressed with blank disappointment.
He had no sooner perused the billet of his mother, than he shut the stable-door, went to the house to announce the altered arrangement to their female domestic, and sauntered into the fields. Mechanically he turned his steps to a knoll, which had been a favourite haunt of himself and Margaret. The young person who was the object of his secret partiality, knew the way in which his morning was destined to be employed, and proposed to herself the pleasure, unseen and alone, of remarking the little features of the scene, all of which were in so many ways associated with her William. She expected no interruption, and was fully disposed to give way to her feelings after that mode, which we only employ when we imagine ourselves secure against the being witnessed by human eye or ear. Solitude has its special prerogatives; and we talk to ourselves, where solitude reigns, in a franker, I had almost said a tenderer style, than we indulge in to the brother of our soul, or to the mistress of our most secret affections.
As Margaret felt certain that William was at a distance, so William, persuaded that at this time he could not be expected near the accustomed brow, had not the slightest anticipation of meeting her. He had been pondering upon his mother. He had been calling up all the little circumstances and thoughts with which he had purposed to gratify her at meeting. From thence his mind had wandered to the recollection of his infant days, and so forward even to the hour of his present review. So far as his mother was concerned, it was all delightful. He remembered her anxieties, the vigilance with which she had ever provided for his welfare and comfort, how she had smoothed for him the pillow of sickness, the tears she had shed over his disappointments, the sweet smiles which had illumined her countenance when she saw him entering with full relish into such pleasures as she provided, or as occurred in the simple scheme of their life. His heart was entirely open. His thoughts were unclad even with that simple armour of which we are almost never divested in any of the intercourses of society. His bosom was laid bare, and seemed to court the gentle, yet enlivening and health-giving breeze, with which the year in its most genial moments visits the breast of mortals.
He had proceeded for some time with his arms folded, or with his left hand on his chin, in that attitude into which we inadvertently fall, when we are in the act of recollecting something which had almost escaped us. Anon he spread his hands abroad in the fulness of his emotion. His step was irregular, and would occasionally grow rapid as if he trod on air. He stopped again. His eyes would then be cast upwards, with the kind of devotion we feel, without being aware of it, in the remembrance of that for which we might well be thankful to the mysterious power, which ‘careth for us’ in things in which we are least able to care for ourselves. His cheeks glowed with pleasure. His eyes were moist with that soft suffusion which comes over mortals, when most impressed with the joys of affectionate sentiment. Margaret perceived him; her first emotion was that of surprise at seeing him there, which was succeeded by an impulse to observe him, that made her for some time careful neither by sound nor gesture to break in upon the current of his thoughts. She was very near him, still without being remarked.
Suddenly, by the mere effect of accident, he turned his eye, and saw the beloved of his soul. There was a stile between them. With the rapidity of agile youth he vaulted over it. ‘With love’s light wings did he o’er perch’ this trivial obstacle, and in a moment was by her side. His soul was already harmonised to every thing that was tender, and frank, and ingenuous. This was an instant in which all reserve was out of the question. He could not but speak all he felt. He had a window in his bosom, less for the use of the bystander than for his own in which he could read all secret things, thoughts which even to his own spirit had been hitherto unknown. It is of the nature of the human mind, that one emotion flows into another of a similar species; and small is the interval between the love of a son for his mother, and the love of a swain for the mistress of his affections. His soul was worked up to the highest pitch by the musings that had occupied his mind; the spirit of Margaret had been elated, as she stood mutely contemplating the emotions and the loveliness of her friend. The sentiments of the one flowed into the channel and swelled the stream of the sentiments of the other. It was like the meeting of rivers, the marriage of the Thames and the Medway, as commemorated by the poet,
Whose blended waters are no more distinguished,
But roll unto the sea one common flood.
My Margaret! exclaimed William, are you here? Oh, what can make me happier than this encounter? I did not know before, how much I loved you. – Yes, loved you!
Dearer than eyesight, space and liberty,
Beyond what can be valued rich or rare.
Till now, I knew only the pleasure I enjoyed when we were together. I attended only to what you said, the sweetness of your tones, the ineffable beauty of your looks. But now I think of you, of the spring from which these transcendent excellencies arise. I think of you as that without which I cannot live. I must have you perpetually near me, familiar as the air I breathe, indefeasible as the vital heat which gives me existence, and is my existence. The glances of your eye, the smiles of your countenance, the tones of your voice, constitute my nourishment; all else is vegetation; but this is happiness. This only gives me power to think, to act, and to enjoy. I cannot bear to be without your presence; or, whenever I am so, the time must be short; only as long as the frame of mind you have given me can continue unimpaired. You must be every thing to me; I must be the thing you love best. Till now I never made love to you. I thought only of you as the most inestimable of friends. I was restrained by ideas of decorum. I was afraid lest, if I overstepped a certain bound, your delicacy might take the alarm. But now I can be silent no longer. I understand my own sentiments; the veil that hid me from my observation is removed. – You must not be offended with me; you will not be offended; for, if I continued silent, I should die.
