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47 - Melmoth The Wanderer by Charles Robert Maturin · Melmoth The Wanderer

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  Speaker 1: Under her by Charles Robert Matin chapter thirty one. There
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  Speaker 1: is an oak beside the froth cladpool where in old time,
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  Speaker 1: as I have often heard, a woman desperate or wretch
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  Speaker 1: like me, ended her woes. Her woes were not like mine.
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  Speaker 1: Ronan will know when he beholds me floating on the stream.
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  Speaker 1: His heart will tell him why Ravine died. Home's fatal discovery.
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  Speaker 1: The increasing decline of Eleanor's health was marked by all
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  Speaker 1: the family. The very servant who stood behind her chair
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  Speaker 1: looked sadder every day. Even Margaret began to repent of
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  Speaker 1: the invitation she had given her to the castle. Eleanor
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  Speaker 1: felt this, and would have spared her what pain she could,
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  Speaker 1: But it was not possible for herself to be insensible
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  Speaker 1: of the fast fading remains of her withering youth and
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  Speaker 1: blighted beauty. The place, the place itself was the principal
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  Speaker 1: cause of that mortal disease that was consumed her. Yet
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  Speaker 1: from that place, she felt she had less resolution to
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  Speaker 1: tear herself every day. So she lived like those sufferers
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  Speaker 1: in eastern prisons, who are not allowed to taste food
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  Speaker 1: unless mixed with poison, and who must perish alike, whether
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  Speaker 1: they eat or forbear. Once urged by intolerable pain of heart,
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  Speaker 1: tortured by living in the placid light of John Sandal's
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  Speaker 1: sunny smile, she confessed this to Margaret. She said, it
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  Speaker 1: is impossible for me to support this existence, impossible to
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  Speaker 1: tread the floor which those steps have tried to listen
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  Speaker 1: for their approach, and when they come feel they do
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  Speaker 1: not bear him. We seek to see every object around
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  Speaker 1: me reflect his image, but never never to see the reality.
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  Speaker 1: To see the door open which once disclosed his figure,
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  Speaker 1: and when it opens, not to see him. And when
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  Speaker 1: he does appear, to see him not what he was,
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  Speaker 1: to feel he is the same and not the same,
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  Speaker 1: the same to the eye, but not to the heart.
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  Speaker 1: To struggle thus between the dream of imagination and the
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  Speaker 1: cruel awaking of reality. Oh, Margaret, that undeception plants a
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  Speaker 1: dagger in the heart, whose point no human hand can extract,
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  Speaker 1: and whose venom no human hand can heal. Margaret wept
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  Speaker 1: as Eleanor spoke thus, and slowly, very slowly, expressed her
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  Speaker 1: consent that Eleanor should quit the castle if it was
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  Speaker 1: necessary for her peace. It was the very evening after
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  Speaker 1: this conversation that eleanor whose habit was to wander among
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  Speaker 1: the woods that surrounded the castle unattended, met with John Sandal.
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  Speaker 1: It was a glorious autumnal evening, just like that on
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  Speaker 1: which they had first met. The associations of nature were
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  Speaker 1: the same. Those of the heart alone had suffered change.
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  Speaker 1: There is that light in an autumn dumnal sky, that
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  Speaker 1: shade in autumnal woods, that dim and hallowed glory in
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  Speaker 1: the evening of the year, which is indefinably combined with recollections. Sandal,
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  Speaker 1: as they met, had spoken to her in the same
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  Speaker 1: voice of melody, and with the same heart thrilling tenderness
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  Speaker 1: of manner that had never ceased to visit her ear
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  Speaker 1: since their first meeting. Like music in dreams, she imagined
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  Speaker 1: there was more than usual feeling in his manner, and
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  Speaker 1: the spot where they were, and which memory made populous
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  Speaker 1: and eloquent with the imagery and speech of other days.
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  Speaker 1: Flattered this illusion, a vague hope trembled at the bottom
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  Speaker 1: of her heart. She thought of what she dared not
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  Speaker 1: to utter, and yet dared to believe. They walked on
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  Speaker 1: together together. They watched the last light on the purple hills,
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  Speaker 1: the deep repose of the woods, whose summits were still
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  Speaker 1: like feathers of gold. Together they once more tasted the
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  Speaker 1: confidenceudance of nature, and amid the most perfect silence, there
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  Speaker 1: was a mutual and unutterable eloquence in their hearts. The
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  Speaker 1: thoughts of other days rushed on Eleanor. She ventured to
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  Speaker 1: raise her eyes to that countenance, which she once more saw,
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  Speaker 1: as it had been that of an angel. The glow
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  Speaker 1: and the smile that made it appear like a reflection
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  Speaker 1: of heaven were there still, But that glow was borrowed
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  Speaker 1: from the bright flush of the glorious west, and that
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  Speaker 1: smile was for nature, not for her. She lingered till
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  Speaker 1: she felt it fade with the fading light, and a
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  Speaker 1: last conviction striking her heart, she burst into an agony
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  Speaker 1: of tears. To his words of affectionate surprise and gentle consolation,
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  Speaker 1: she answered only by fixing her appealing eyes on him
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  Speaker 1: and agonizingly invoking his name. She had trusted to nature
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  Speaker 1: and to this sein of their first meeting, to act
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  Speaker 1: as an interpreter between them, and still, even in despair,
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  Speaker 1: she trusted to it. Perhaps there is not a more
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  Speaker 1: agonizing moment than that in which we feel the aspect
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  Speaker 1: of nature give a perfect vitality to the associations of
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  Speaker 1: our hearts, while they lie buried in those in which
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  Speaker 1: we try in vain to revive them. She was soon
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  Speaker 1: undeceived with that benignity which, while it speaks of consolation,
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  Speaker 1: forbids hope, with that smile which angels may be supposed
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  Speaker 1: to give on the last conflict of a sufferer who
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  Speaker 1: is casting off the garments of mortality in pain and hope.
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  Speaker 1: With such an expression, he whom she loved, regarded her
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  Speaker 1: from another world. He might have cast such a glance
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  Speaker 1: on her, and it sealed her doom in this forever.
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  Speaker 1: As unable to witness the agony of the wound he
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  Speaker 1: had inflicted but could not heal, he turned from her.
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  Speaker 1: The last light of day faded from the hills, The
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  Speaker 1: sun of both worlds set on her eye and soul.
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  Speaker 1: She sunk on the earth, and notes of faint music
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  Speaker 1: that seemed designed to echo the words no, no, no,
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  Speaker 1: never never more trembled in her ears. They were as
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  Speaker 1: simple and monotonous as the words themselves, and were played
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  Speaker 1: accidentally by a peasant boy who was wandering in the woods.
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  Speaker 1: But to the unfortunate everything seems prophetic, and amid the
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  Speaker 1: shades of evening, and accompanied by the sound of his
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  Speaker 1: departing footsteps, the breaking heart of Eleanor accepted the augury
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  Speaker 1: of these melancholy notes. A few days after this final meeting,
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  Speaker 1: Eleanor wrote to her aunt and Yorke to announce that
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  Speaker 1: if she still lived and was not unwilling to admit her,
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  Speaker 1: she would reside with her for life, and she could
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  Speaker 1: not help intimating that her life would probably not outlast
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  Speaker 1: that of her hostess. She did not tell what the
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  Speaker 1: widow Sandal had whispered to her at her first arrival
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  Speaker 1: at the castle, and what she now ventured to repeat,
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  Speaker 1: with a tone that struggled between the imperative and the persuasive,
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  Speaker 1: the conciliating and the intimidative. Eleanor yielded, and the indelicacy
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  Speaker 1: of this representation had only the effect to make her
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  Speaker 1: shrink from its repetition. On her departure, Margaret wept, and
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  Speaker 1: Sandal showed as much tender officiousness about her journey as
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  Speaker 1: if it were to terminate. In their renewed bridle to
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  Speaker 1: escape from this, Eleanor hastened her preparations for departure. When
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  Speaker 1: she arrived at a certain distance from the castle, she
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  Speaker 1: dismissed the family carriage and said she would go on
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  Speaker 1: foot with her female servant to the farmhouse, where horses
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  Speaker 1: were awaiting her. She went there, but remained concealed, for
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  Speaker 1: the report of the approaching bridle resounded in her ears.
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  Speaker 1: The day arrived, Eleanor rose very early. The bells rung
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  Speaker 1: out a merry peal, as she had once heard them
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  Speaker 1: do on another occasion. The troops of friends arrived, in
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  Speaker 1: greater numbers and with equal gaiety as they had once
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  Speaker 1: assembled to escort her. She saw their equipages gleaming along.
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  Speaker 1: She heard the joyous shouts of half the county. She
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  Speaker 1: imagined to herself, the timid smile of Margaret, and the
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  Speaker 1: irradiated countenance of him who had been her bridegroom. Suddenly
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  Speaker 1: there was a pause. She felt that the ceremony was
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  Speaker 1: going on was finished, that the irrevocable words were spoken,
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  Speaker 1: the indissoluble tie was knit again. The shout and wild
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  Speaker 1: joyants burst forth. As the sumptuous cavalcade returned to the castle.
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  Speaker 1: The glare of the equipages the splendid habits of the writers,
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  Speaker 1: the cheerful group of shouting tenantry. She saw it all.
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  Speaker 1: When all was over, Eleanor glanced accidentally at her dress.
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  Speaker 1: It was white, like her bridal habit. Shuddering, she exchanged
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  Speaker 1: it for a morning habit and set out, as she hoped,
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  Speaker 1: on her last journey. End of chapter thirty one.