Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1867-03-13


seems"
Yes, madam, L have had some very
severe and dreadful trials; but am very
happy and hopeful in spite of them all,
for know that now they will soon be end
ed, and that shall recover all that have
lost when l reach the heavenly land"
How do you know that q? don't know
it. When buried my only child down in
the garden there, l thought had lost him
forever. That was why, in my stony grief,
no tear ever fell upon his grave. 1 have
been trying these fifteen years to believe
what you say you believe; but it has no
consolation for me- God took nv child
away from me in my bitterest need, and be
took him forever Was it a good God who
did that?''
Her voice was cold and rigid, and Il
pallor as of death was upon her face as
shr paused for reply.
"A good God, madam. and whom he
loveth he chasteneth ~
NO, indeed, sir, | don't believe that.
He didn't love me, and l didn't love him,
and don't love him now hate him rather.
lie has tried me too sorely."
My dear friend, you know not what
you say. L beseech you, do not blaspheme
your God"
4" have only said, sir, for once, what
have been thinking all these dreadful wears.
When | buried my child down there, | did
not believe in any God for years. l
thought some vile and fendish Fate was
pursuing me- Then you ministers were al
ways saying to me, Pray; and | prayed
They said to me, Study the word of God >
and | studied it, 1t has been my only
study for fifteen years, and it has brought
me no consolation vet"
But you have found God in it,-have
you not? You do not deny q God?"
Il have found a God in it certainly, but
only God who has separated me eternally
| from all | love"
My dear friend, l assure you, you have
not yet found the true God, if YOU believe
/ this
:" | have found | verify believe the God
of the Bible, and he has said the wick ed
shall 20 away into everlasting punishment ;
and | am the most wicked of all Gods
/ creatures
Here Mrs. Wayland left him standing
upon the colonnade, and hurried rapidly
from him down the path which led to the
sea. Her cOnversatio had revived in her
heart all the strong passions which sum-
bered there. and which she usually held in
close repression As she paced wildly up
and down the beach, feeling in her near
ness to the sea u sort Of comfort as though
the great ocean were her friend, she thought
over her whole lonely life She thought
of her happy and brilliant youth, of ito
gayeties, its triumphs. and its great hopes :;
She beheld herself the petted darling Of !.
joyous circle of companions and friends
She thought of her Journeys in distant
lands. whittier loving father had taken
her, and Of all the delights Of those years
when they had wandered through all the
sunny climes of southern Europe, and so
away on to the Orient, where she had
trodden with pilgrim feet all the sacred
places of that Holy Land. 1t was there
she had first met her husband and she
dwelt with tondnesS upon every little incl
dent which memory recalled of her inter
course with him there, and Of how they
had sailed together upon their return to
their native land. 1t was then she had
learned to love the ocean. In those long
days. when they We're out upon the track
less deep, they had learned together the
sweet mystery of loving Night after
night they had paced the deck together,
gazing out upon the moonlighted expanse,
and watching the breakers rise and fall
The long voyage had been a season Of en-
chantment. 1t had passed into her being,
and become part of her inmost life for
ever. She had one Of those natures to
whom such things come but once in life
time. When they had reached home, they
had been married, and, after a year or two
Of pleasant married life. they had built the
old gray house of which | have told YOU,
designing to pass their summers down there
within hearing of the grand, eternal an
them Of the sea How well she remem-
bered the hurry they were to get down
here,-so great hurry they could not
stop TO have the house entirely finished.
ana 50 in early May they had furnished
two or three rooms, and lived there in q
wild trance of what seems to her now, as
she looks back upon it, perfect bliss. Here
they wandered up and down the beach to-
gether hand in hand for hours and beheld
/ the waters glowing in the early tints of
sunrise, and rejecting the gorgeous splen-
dors OF sunset, and ripping and simmer
ing in the bewildering moonlight. Then
she thinks of how gayeties began up at the
village yonder, and how they began to see
much company and to mingle in all the ex-
citements of watering-place life. Here
they had met the beautiful syren who had
stolen her husband from her. With what
angry hate she dwells upon the soft, be-
wildering beauty of that woman,-her
rounded dimpled form, her golden hair,
and the languishing blueness of the dreamy
eyes, She seemed in all her bewitching
beauty, to the eye of Agnes Wayland, more
hateful and hideous than fend She had
fascinated Mortimer Wayland almost from
their first meeting. OF dreamy, sensu-
Gus temperament, and a weak will, and
with no great power of principle at his
back, the artful and wicked woman had en-
shared him with her wiles, and in the
meshes of her charms he had forgotten the
grand and queeny wife, who to every eye
was so infinitely the superior of one for
whom he was deserting her, and the little
year-old baby, who was Just learning to
! lisp father" to him as he fondled him.
OF the wild tempest which tossed her
soul at this time she dreaded to think even
now 1t had been so near to madness that
it was a terror to her yet. But pride had
always been one of her ruling passions,
and, instead of pleading with him with "a
woman's tenderness, as some might have
done, she had treated him with coldness
and disdain, and with reproachful scorn
had goaded him on to take the last step in
the dreadful drama.
He had deserted her. and with the blue