The words were scarce out of my
mouth when the Count de L—’s post-chaise, with his
sister in it, drove hastily by: she had just time to make me a
bow of recognition,—and of that particular kind of it,
which told me she had not yet done with me. She was as good
as her look; for, before I had quite finished my supper, her
brother’s servant came into the room with a billet, in
which she said she had taken the liberty to charge me with a
letter, which I was to present myself to Madame R— the
first morning I had nothing to do at Paris. There was only
added, she was sorry, but from what penchant she had not
considered, that she had been prevented telling me her
story,—that she still owed it to me; and if my route should
ever lay through Brussels, and I had not by then forgot the name
of Madame de L—,—that Madame de L— would be
glad to discharge her obligation.
Then I will meet thee, said I, fair spirit! at
Brussels;—’tis only returning from Italy through
Germany to Holland, by the route of Flanders,
home;—’twill scarce be ten posts out of my way; but,
were it ten thousand! with what a moral delight will it crown my
journey, in sharing in the sickening incidents of a tale
of misery told to me by such a sufferer? To see her weep!
and, though I cannot dry up the fountain of her tears, what an
exquisite sensation is there still left, in wiping them away from
off the cheeks of the first and fairest of women, as I’m
sitting with my handkerchief in my hand in silence the whole
night beside her?
There was nothing wrong in the sentiment; and yet I instantly
reproached my heart with it in the bitterest and most reprobate
of expressions.
It had ever, as I told the reader, been one of the singular
blessings of my life, to be almost every hour of it miserably in
love with some one; and my last flame happening to be blown out
by a whiff of jealousy on the sudden turn of a corner, I had
lighted it up afresh at the pure taper of Eliza but about three
months before,—swearing, as I did it, that it should last
me through the whole journey.—Why should I dissemble the
matter? I had sworn to her eternal fidelity;—she had
a right to my whole heart:—to divide my affections was to
lessen them;—to expose them was to risk them: where there
is risk there may be loss:—and what wilt thou have, Yorick,
to answer to a heart so full of trust and confidence—so
good, so gentle, and unreproaching!
—I will not go to Brussels, replied I, interrupting
myself.—But my imagination went on,—I recalled her
looks at that crisis of our separation, when neither of us had
power to say adieu! I look’d at the picture she had
tied in a black riband about my neck,—and blush’d as
I look’d at it.—I would have given the world to have
kiss’d it,—but was ashamed.—And shall this
tender flower, said I, pressing it between my hands,—shall
it be smitten to its very root,—and smitten, Yorick! by
thee, who hast promised to shelter it in thy breast?
Eternal Fountain of Happiness! said I, kneeling down upon the
ground,—be thou my witness—and every pure spirit
which tastes it, be my witness also, That I would not travel to
Brussels, unless Eliza went along with me, did the road lead me
towards heaven!
In transports of this kind, the heart, in spite of the
understanding, will always say too much.
