whose heart ought to be set alone uponthe world towards which I am hastening; but Heaven will pardon a fatherfor thinking of his only child."
"My dear father, speak not thus of quitting me!" exclaimed Luis, hisvoice choking with grief, and with willing blindness deceiving himself;"Heaven will yet spare you to me."
"Do not flatter yourself with false hopes, Luis, which will unfit youfor the moment which must so soon come," answered the Count. "Yet,before I go, I would speak to you on a subject which has long oppressedme. Do not judge harshly of any man till you know the motives of hisactions, nor bear hostile feelings towards him because he differs fromyou in his opinions, unless they advocate immorality or irreligion.Alas! I wish that I had always acted as I now counsel you to do. I hada brother, some few years younger than myself, a gay and gallant youth,with impetuous feelings and headstrong passions, but possessed of anoble and generous soul, which despised danger, and could but ill bearrestraint. At an early age he became imbued with the hereticaldoctrines of religion, then first introduced in this country. He wasalso strongly opposed to the system of government which has for so manyyears existed, and took no pains to conceal either one or the other.The expression of his religious opinions might have passed unnoticed, ashe never attempted to make converts to them; but when he ventured tolift his voice against what he called the vices of the priests, thebigotry of the people, the sycophancy of the nobles, and the tyranny ofthe sovereign, all joined in condemning him; even I, as his brother,deemed that his presumption ought to be punished. He was persecuted onevery side; his life, even, was demanded as the only recompense for hiscrime, and the Inquisition endeavoured to lay hold of him. He came tome for aid to escape, but I looked upon him as an infidel and a traitor,and refused my assistance, telling him as my reason, that I could notanswer to my conscience for my doing so. I remember his last words:`Brother,' he said, `I shall not cease to love you; for you act as youthink right--I speak according to my judgment; though I should have been_wiser_ to have held silence. I will not now ask you to do what youconsider wrong. Farewell!' Without uttering another word, he left me,and I saw him no more. My heart smote me for my cruelty and want ofbrotherly affection; but my confessor, the Father Jacinto, who had urgedme so to act, assured me I had done rightly; for that it would have beenparticipating in the sin to have aided so impious an heretic: yet Icould not forget his last words, nor have I ever forgiven myself. Mybrother could not effect his escape: he was seized, imprisoned, tried,and condemned to expiate his crimes on the burning shores of Africa,where death would soon have finished his career, but he never reachedhis destination. The ship which bore him was never more heard of, andwas supposed to have foundered in a violent storm, which was known tohave raged in the latitudes where she was. I have never receivedfurther tidings of my unfortunate brother. Alas! my conduct towards himis the bitterest draught of death; but we shall yet meet in anotherworld, where he will forgive me my trespass towards him."
Exhausted by the exertion he had made to speak, the Count fell back intohis son's arms.
Luis now gazed with alarm at his father's countenance, which had assumedthe ghastly hue of death; but, in a few minutes, the Count againrevived, and gave his hand a gentle pressure, to assure him of hisconsciousness, yet some time elapsed ere he again spoke. We need notdetail more of the conversation between the father and son, nor are wefond of describing death-bed scenes, where no object is to be gained bythe contemplation. We delight not to harrow up the feelings of ourreaders by descriptions of those mournful and inevitable occurrenceswith which we must all be more or less familiar, and which cannot failof bringing back melancholy recollections to our minds, while we have along catalogue before us of strange and terrible events, their verystrangeness interesting, though persuading us that we can never bedoomed to witness the like.
The conversation of the Count and his son was interrupted by the arrivalof the priest to administer extreme unction to the dying man, the voiceof the choristers, chanting the hymn of the dying, being heard without.How mournfully did the notes strike upon the ear of Luis! Often had heheard them before, but then they were sung to the departing soul of someperson indifferent to him--now, to the being he revered most on earth.
The Count having confessed his sins, and the last sacrament beingadministered to him, the priest, in his gilded canonicals, took hisdeparture, bearing in his hands the sacred emblems; his head beingprotected from the sun's rays by a silken awning, supported on poles byfour attendants, when the sick man was left to die in peace.
Ere another sun arose, the old Count's forebodings were fulfilled--hehad ceased to breathe, and Luis found himself alone in the world. Onthe following day, the body of the Count, dressed in full costume, anddecorated with the orders he possessed, was laid out in an open coffin,placed on high trestles in the centre of the chapel belonging to thehouse. Here all the surrounding population attended, with marks of realsorrow, to take a last farewell of one who had ever been an indulgentlandlord to his tenants and a friend to all.
In the evening it was carried to the neighbouring church, where was thetomb of his family. The interior of the church was hung with black, anda canopy of black cloth and silver was erected over the spot where thebody was deposited during the performance of the service, the tenants,and those friends who had been enabled to arrive in time, lining eachside of the building, with thick wax tapers in their hands, upwards ofseven feet in length. The service being over, the lid of the coffin wasclosed, and the key delivered to the care of the person of highest rankpresent, whose duty it was to present it to the heir of the deceased,the young Count d'Almeida.
The day after the funeral, as Luis was seated in solitude, his minddwelling with sad satisfaction on the affection and the many virtues ofthe parent he had lost, Pedro entered the room, and placed a letter inhis hands. He examined the seal, which appeared to have been broken andagain closed without much care; but he thought not more of thecircumstance after he had torn open the envelope. It was from his youngfriend, Don Joze de Tavora. His colour went and came, and his eyeflashed, as he read on. The words were to this effect:--
"Much esteemed and dear Friend,--Knowing you to be a man of that highhonour and integrity, surpassed by none, to you I write freely andopenly. I have been very wretched lately, not on my own account, but onthat of my brother; he has been insulted, grossly insulted, by one fromwhom he can gain no satisfaction, who would be above all laws, human anddivine, and who would, to gratify his own evil inclinations, trample onour dearest rights and privileges--he hopes with impunity. In that heis mistaken. He forgets that his nobles, at least those who are worthyof the name, cherish their honour before their lives, and that they wearswords to protect both one and the other. His name I will not mention--you know it. You have not forgot, I know, your promise to defend, tothe last drop of your blood, the fame of your cousin Theresa, my lovelysister-in-law. The time has now arrived to do so. She has been dailypersecuted by the attentions of that high personage during my brother'sabsence. I believe her innocent of all crime; for surely one so lovelycannot be guilty; but my brother, mad with jealousy, is not sopersuaded, and has sworn to be avenged on the disturber of hishappiness. No plan is yet arranged, but whatever is done will requirethe aid of all the high-born and pure nobles of the land to carry intoeffect. To you, therefore, Luis, I write, to summon you, without delay,both to counsel and to act. More I may not say, but I rely upon yournot failing to fulfil your promise. Adeos, dear friend, and fortunateam I to be able so to call you."--The letter was signed, "Joze Maria deTavora."
"Theresa in danger!" he exclaimed, "the greatest danger which can befalla woman;--she I once loved so fondly! I must fly to rescue her. Buthow? Alas, we cannot tear her from the hands of our sovereign withoutbeing accused of treason! Even that risk would I brave to secure herinnocence. No, Theresa would not, cannot be guilty!"
With a troubled mind, forgetting entirely his own cause for grief, Luisarose, and summoning Pedro, ordered him to
prepare for a quick departurefor Lisbon. He then set to work to perform the many duties his father'sdemise had rendered necessary before he could leave his home. Pedro wasin high glee at the thoughts of another visit to Lisbon. He had grownheartily weary of the monotonous quiet of his master's home, after thebustle and activity to which he had become accustomed during histravels; and he had managed to quarrel with his country love, so that hehad become very anxious to renew his acquaintance with the fair one headmired in the city, should she still remain faithful to him.
Two days necessarily passed before the young Count, for so we may infuture call Luis, was prepared to quit his home. The journey was a sadand silent one; for he was far too deeply occupied to listen to the idleprating of Senhor Pedro, who considered it part of his duty to endeavourto amuse his master. Luis, though fully alive to the danger