THE DOUBLE VOW.
Henry was a youth of fifteen, which is as much as to say that he hadgood intentions, but did not always carry them out in practice. Heloved his father and his tutor, but he loved his pleasures still more;he would have done anything to make them happy, but he did not givethem the greatest of all happiness, that of seeing him docile andwell-conducted. The impetuosity of his disposition often drew fromthose he loved bitter tears, which in the end made his own flow. Hislife was thus divided between faults and repentance; and his goodintentions were so continually rendered useless by reprehensibleactions, that his friends at last gave up all hopes of his amendment.His father, the Count of A----, was constantly thinking, withincreasing anxiety, of the time when Henry must leave him to enterthe university, or to travel. The paths of vice would then presentthemselves to him under the most seductive aspects, and there would nolonger be the hand of a father to restrain or his voice to call himback; he might fall deeper and deeper into error, and return to thepaternal mansion with a heart corrupted, despoiled of its purity andelevation, and incapable even of that feeling which is at least thereflection of virtue--repentance.
The count was of a mild but feeble character, and his health wasdelicate; the death of the countess, his wife, had mined beneathhis feet the ground on which he rested. Henry, on the return of hisfather's birthday, fancied that he could hear a secret voice sayingto him, "The fragile layer of earth which bears thy father, andseparates him from thy mother's ashes, will soon crumble away, and hewill disappear from thy view without carrying with him to the tomb thehope of thy amendment." This day he shed burning tears; but what availtears and softened feelings when they do not produce amendment? Hewent into the park where stood the tomb of his mother, together withthe empty sepulchre which, during an illness, his father had caused tobe constructed for himself. There, he made a solemn vow to combat theviolence of his temper and his love of pleasure; but, alas! I shouldtoo deeply grieve my young readers were I to relate in detail how onlya few days before that appointed for his going to the university, hewas guilty of a fault which cruelly pierced the heart of his unhappyfather, already so deeply wounded. The count fell ill, and was confinedto his bed without being able to flatter himself with the hope that hemight witness the return of his son to virtue, before he was calledupon to exchange his melancholy couch for the bed of stone whichawaited him in the park.
I will not then describe to you either the fault or the regret ofHenry; but in passing a severe judgment on his errors you may as wellextend it also to those of which at any time you may yourselves havebeen guilty. What child can approach the dying bed of his parents,without saying to himself, "Alas! if I have not deprived them of wholeyears of life, who knows by how many weeks or days I may not haveshortened their term? I may perhaps have added to the sufferings whichnow I would so gladly have mitigated, and my follies may have closedbefore their time those eyes which, but for me, might still enjoy thelight of day!" It is because the fatal consequences of our faultsare concealed from view that reckless mortals are so bold in thecommission of crimes: man gives free scope to the ungoverned desiresof his heart, as he might let loose a set of ferocious animals; hepermits them under favour of the darkness to wander amongst mankind;but he sees not how many innocent people are wounded or torn to pieces:he madly flings around him burning brands, lighted by guilty passions,and when he has already sunk into the tomb, the neighbouring houses onwhich the fatal spark has alighted, burst into flames, and the densecolumn of smoke hovers over the place of his repose like a monumentraised to his shame.
Henry, when all hope of recovery was at an end, could no longer supportthe melancholy and care-worn aspect of his father: he remained inthe adjacent chamber, and there, whilst the count's ebbing life wasstruggling against repeated fainting-fits, he addressed his silentprayers to Heaven, closed his eyes to the future, and dreaded, like theexplosion of a terrible shell, those first awful words, "_He is dead._"The time, however, came when he must present himself before his father,take leave of him, receive his forgiveness, and give him his promise ofamendment.
Alone in the apartment adjoining that of the invalid, he had rousedhimself from a long and painful stupor: he listened, and heard onlythe voice of his aged tutor, who had been his father's preceptoralso, and who, now seeing the approach of the shadows of death, gavehim his blessing in these words: "Go calmly to thy sleep, virtuoussoul! May all thy good actions, all thy promises fulfilled, all thypious thoughts, be gathered around thee at the close of life, as thebeautiful clouds of evening gather round the sun when sinking in thewest! Smile once more if you can hear my words, and if your dyingheart has still the power of feeling." The invalid made an effort torouse himself from the heavy sleep of his swoon, but he did not smile,for, in the confusion of his senses, he had mistaken the voice ofhis preceptor for that of his son. "Henry," he stammered in imperfectaccents, "I cannot see you, but I hear you. Lay your hand on my heart,and solemnly promise me that you will become virtuous." Henry rushedforward to make this promise, but the preceptor had already placed hishand on the fluttering heart of the father, and, with a sign to theson, said, in a low voice, "I promise for you." The heart of the countwas still beating with that slow and languid motion which announces thenear extinction of life; he neither heard the vow, nor the friends whosurrounded him.
Henry, sinking under this heart-rending scene, and trembling for thatwhich must succeed it, resolved to quit the chateau, and not returntill the most agonizing hours of his affliction should have passedaway, but he felt that this amendment must not commence by a secretflight. He therefore announced to his preceptor, "that he could nolonger support this dreadful sight, but that he would return in aweek," and then he added, in a voice choked with grief, "I shall stillfind a father here." He embraced him, told him where he meant toseclude himself, and left the house.
With faltering steps he traversed the park. He perceived the twowhite sepulchres visible through the trees, and approached them. Notdaring to touch the yet empty tomb beneath which his father was torepose, he leaned against the one which covered a heart which he hadnot broken, that of his mother, whom he had lost many years before. Onthat mother's tomb, and in the presence of God, he renewed his vow ofamendment.
Every step he took brought back the memory of his errors; a child ledby his father, a pit, a fading leaf, the sound of a church-bell, allawakened the most painful recollections.
He reached the place of his retreat, but after four days of remorse, oftears and of anguish, he felt that he ought to return to the chateau,and prove the sincerity of his regret for the loss of his father byimitating his virtues. The most noble commemoration that man can offerto those whom he has loved, and whose loss he deplores, is to dry thetears of those who suffer;--a series of good works is the fairestgarland that can be suspended over their tombs.
Henry again turned his steps homewards: it was evening when he crossedthe park; and the dusky pyramid which surmounted his father's tomblooked through the trees, like one of those grey clouds which floatin the azure sky, over the blackened ruins of a village destroyed byfire. Henry stopped: he leaned his head against the cold marble, hisface bathed with tears, but there was no gentle voice to bid him "beconsoled." No father there to show his affection by tenderly repeating,"I pardon thee." The rustling of the leaves sounded to him as a murmurof anger, and the obscurity of the evening chilled him with the terrorof some horrible gloom. However, he recovered himself, and renewed inthese words the vow which his tutor had pronounced in his name: "Oh!father! dear father! Do you hear your poor child who is weeping overyour grave? Look at me; on my knees I implore your forgiveness, Ipromise to fulfil the vow which my tutor pronounced for me upon yourdying heart. Oh father! father!"--here grief stifled his voice--"willyou not give your child some token of your forgiveness!"
A rustling among the leaves was audible, a figure slowly advancing putaside the branches, and said, "I have pardoned you." It was his father!That which is intermediate between sleep and death
, a deep swoon, hadrestored him to life by throwing him into a salutary lethargy. It wasthe first time he had been out, and he came, accompanied by his ancientpreceptor, to offer his thanks on his tomb. Tender father! if thouhadst indeed passed into another world, thy heart could not thus havethrobbed with joy, nor thine eyes shed tears of happiness, on thereturn of a penitent son who came to cast at thy feet a regenerate man!
I cannot draw the curtain over this affecting scene, without addressingone important question to my young readers. Are you still so happy asto possess a father and a mother, to whom you may afford inexpressiblejoy by your affection and your good conduct? Ah! if any one of you hashitherto neglected to procure them this felicity, I will take upon methe office of a conscience which cannot fail some day to awaken, and Itell him that a time will come when nothing can afford him consolationif he has to say to himself, "They loved me above all things, yet Ihave seen them expire without having given them the happiness of beingable to say, My child is virtuous."