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December 4, 1852.] THE LEADER. 1169
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DEFACEMENT OF PICTURES AT THE NATIONAL G...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Xii. March 9, 1852. I^Fgpielen , I Never...
« You are doing injustice to yourself , Markham , " I said . And I remonstrated with him , for going to Johnson instead of the girl herself ; since he could not know what mischief that might have done . It would be difficult to make you understand how he not onl y received , but welcomed my remonstrances . He confessed he was " an ass ; " he talked of making a trip up the Rhine or the Nile , to get out of the way of Margaret ' s laughter ; but remembered that he could not leave business yet . " And there is my father to provide for . " , « Markham , " I said ; " Margaret will not laugh at you , but she will be proud of you as a friend . Do not go away from her , but to her . Always march up to a difficulty . "
And without any trouble , I bore him off at once . Edwardes and the women were in the drawing-room , tea just departing . The instant I entered the room , Julie seized me , and holding me by the shoulders , complained to Edwardes , who gazed upon her with undisguised delight , that J , after being absent from her for years , after knowing that she had come from America on purpose to throw herself into my arms , had left her within a few minutes , and in obedience to that very young and solemn lady , who stood looking at us , had gone away to settle some matrimonial or nonmatrimonial mysteries .
All this while Markham stood like Coriolanus on the hearth of Tullus Aufidius ; and Margaret , with her inexorable self-possession , stood also , conscious but unrecognising . I crushed the fluttering obtruder in my arms , and taking Markham by the hand , I challenged Margaret to receive him as a friend whom she would learn to value . She took his hand from mine , and I could see a cordial pressure . Markham was at home . " But , Julie ; I said , the ' surprise' ? What is it that you have brought , that is to astonish us ?" Clasping her hands together , Julie looked at me very slyly , and said , " What if it were a husband ?"
" I should have seen him by this time . " " I will not keep you , Tristan , —you see I already know you by your new name . " She cast her eyes round , opened the piano-forte , placed a song upon it , looked at Yseult , who sat down ; and , without any preface , the young Canadian dashed into " Una voce poco fa . " She had never told me even that she was learning ! As I looked at her in amaze , she increased her dash and vigour ; and never did the lovely rebel of Rossini find a more brilliant utterance . You know how daring-skill delights me ; but to realize it thus in my own blood ! As she finished , I folded her in my arms , and exclaimed that I loved her alone , better than anything in the world .
" No , you don't , " said Margaret . " You may love Julie ; but have I not leaned upon you when I was suffering ? have you not served me when I was helpless ? do we not know each other ' s dearest wishes ?—and dare you say before me , Tristan , tlmt there is only Julie whom you love ? " She spoke in her own name ; but I could follow her thought : her reproach included other associations . From Margaret my eyes turned to Yseult , and hers met mine with a look of stedfast and reproachful inquiry , recalling all that Margaret had told me . Still I hesitated to understand so literally as Margaret spoke . " You must sing as well , then , " I answered , " I will love you as well . "
" I cannot . But—yes , I will . " And Margaret turned to the duett , " Ebbene , a te , ferisci , " which she had so often sung with Yseult . " Well , " cried Julie , with all the impudence of a half-child sister , when they had done , " and why don't you love them as you loved me ?" I folded in my arms the calm Margaret , who looked a dignified pardon . " And Yseult ! " cried Edwardes . I kissed her on the cheek , which burned against my lips . But I half hated the ceremony , which falsified itself by its compulsion . Julie , however , clapped her hands .
We had more music , and satisfied Julie ' s love of surprise with our admiration of the treasure she had brought over in a voice and spirit so rare Supper , and then more music , [ n the course of the evening I saw that Markham and Margaret conversed together more than once . The great grocer was unusually grave and subdued , more by Margaret ' s unaffected frankness than by anything else . He seemed to be really learning . With «• proud tact , he had dropped the suitor as abruptly an ho bad taken up the character , and lie replaced it by si brotherly familiarity very natural to him . ¦ Julie tease <| him as mercilessly as any of us ; carrying her audacity so far 'w to ask him " what he came there for ?"
" I eainc , " lie replied , meeting her effrontery by a courage prepared to outdo hers , " ¦ because 1 had been fool enough to behave presumptuously to Margaret Johnson , and because I wished to be forgiven . Hut what makes you ask me ?" " Oh ! now you are going beyond your right . Men ought to disclose themselves frankly ; women should be reserved . " " A rule which leads men into mistakes . If women were always frank , men would learn a habit of being ; more consistent , and just . " " Now , really , Mr . Markham , it is time for you to go : when men philosop hize it in a nign they are getting sleepy . " A «» l go he did ; but not for ever , 1 could see .
Julie tells me that she has brought over her voice for a purpose—winch she will explain when she knows mp plans better . Always mystery ! And sI >« is so frank , and ao impatient to tell ! All our thoughts ut present ,
however , are directed to devising a country trip for Margaret , whose health needs it . I want to bring her to Valperduta : " In 1854 , " she replies . Were I a philosopher , Helen , I should be half inclined to analyze the varieties of female character which have come before me since I have been in England , in order to seek an answer for my own question , how much is real and how much is factitious . I do not mean affected . The affectations which were so common when I was here in my boyhood , seem to me for the most part to have gone . But what I now see appears to me , in a still larger proportion , to be more the factitious product of set opinions , customs , and artificial training , than of inborn forces . Most women appear to be
moulded , like their clothes , to a pattern—or like their own feet in the universally narrow shoe . In Mrs . Johnson I see the extinction of the individual , hut half-effected in Sarah Selby , and begun only in the daughters . But even in the less sophisticate , perhaps exceptional cases , there is the same dominance of the artificial . Their very emotions are custom-grown . . Poor Fanny Chetham is nearly as rude as woman can be , and I see the natural working of instinct in that affectionate impulse which makes gratitude for service mistake itself for " love . " But she , who is woman , and nothing more , is converted to a murderess . That is her allotted part . Dear consin . Julie , so little altered since I remember her light laugh outside her father ' s
cabin , long before the house au petit portage was built , is prepared to take her stand as a competitor , —to feel and to provoke that factitious passion which is confounded with instinctive jealousy . Eager for admiration , she is pleased at homage even from me , and almost forces me to render it in form . But I can see that she has already made up her mind to appropriate Markham . It is not her study of art that has done that ! it is her careful trustee , old Norm , her schoolmistress Lehocq . And although she has not as yet a soul in the world but me to care for , her brother in truth , she is almost challenging a competition for me with others whose relation she cannot understand . Even Yseult , direct and thoroughly genuine as she is ,
submits , I can see , to a certain mould put upon her—yields to be something less , dr at least something different from what she is , and so far disguises her real nature . But perhaps I scarcely dare to penetrate that riddle , The only woman , not excepting even you , dear Helen—for you condescend to be " jealous" of my regard for you , engrafted as that is in the dearest part of my past life . Why do people so misunderstand friendship between man and woman , that because , as I feel with you , man cannot forget the tender influence of womanhood , and his friendship takes a gentler expression , it must always be supposed that there is " love . " Love you , I do ; and no love , however great , can obliterate that affection . If Giorgio
had not been , nor Yseult , possibly we might have used that ambiguous and indiscriminate word with a different meaning . But you have been so moulded to Giorgio ' great heart , that you could not match with any other , as hearts must match in love that is nearest ; and you could not be content with any half love . You are not my " sister" ; and I hate pretences against fact . Why are those subterfuges so common ? But we have lived side by side , each absorbed in an all-sufficing love . In what , then , can my regard for any other woman resemble my friendship for you , that you should be " jealous . " Decidedly when you last wrote you were ill .
Indeed , the only woman whom I perfectly understand , and always , is Margaret . And that is because she is so simple , so direct , so singleminded in all she does . She never intends something beside that which she professes ; she is never diverted by any collateral issue . To her there is no fear lest a thing should be that which it is not . In her friendship for me , —and I believe I am prouder of it than of any other that I have enjoyed , —she is not deterred from the direct , open , and complete manifestation of it , lest people " think" that it is something more than she means . She knows , as well as I do , that to her I am not Stanhope ; but she does not shape her conduct by other people ' s possible misconceptions . Nor will she let her own fate be determined by the feeble will of others . She considers each question on its own merits , and will not let her destiny be shaped by the veto of those who cannot fulfil it .
Her ill health has brought out this strength but the more strongly . Her fixed purpose never faulters ; and thus we all feel a certainty in her which gives to the affection for her sin amount of repose which L have known with her alone . For even Yseult with the dark brow would
accuse you of " change ; . " With Margaret it seems as if it were only necessary to say a thing once . Now you will be " jealous" ; ami if I were humbler , I might be proud to be the object of that feeling of com petition . Hut it is so with Margaret ; and yet how does my consciousness of that fact alter the dear love between you and me , which depends not upon Margaret ' s qualities , but upon your own , and upon my capacity to understand those own . Why are we always judging of a thing precious to us by something else V
December 4, 1852.] The Leader. 1169
December 4 , 1852 . ] THE LEADER . 1169
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Defacement Of Pictures At The National G...
DEFACEMENT OF PICTURES AT THE NATIONAL GALLERY . Tins cleaners are- u ^ uin at their work in the . . National Gallery , defacing tlio pietui'CH . After a repose of five yearn , 1-Imy have resumed their activil . y , on a more extennivo hohIo limn before ; and as before , Mr . Morrjs Moore in the portion to announce Iliis more than Turkish destruction of a , rt . Tlio now denunciation has sonfc many to the gallery , to seo what has boett
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 4, 1852, page 21, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_04121852/page/21/
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