wondrous meaning was as changeful and exhaustless as the picture of the cloud in the rippling spring. Her face was a gay masquerade of expression. A child of sorrow was this beautiful being-amiable as she was lovely, yet unfathomable in a passing acquaintance. Outwardly lively and dashing, she was one of that strange few who, when they list, can stand calm, dark, and unread under the scrutiny of the world. Grief has been said to exert a chastening influence, but sometimes it nurtures dangerous predispositions-but of this again. At the age of fifteen, Catharine Harman had lost a sainted mother. Two years after, an only brother, led by that fever of travel and adventure so seducing to youth, had left his home, and been killed in a duel in a distant state. His blooming sister was left with but two relatives on earth-a passionate indulgent old father, and a portionless male cousin, two years her junior, who was away at college. The fair Kate Harman had been brought up a pretty pet, which is to say that she was self-willed, though, like many pets, her heart was in the right place. The rose that flowers in a garden of weeds is the sweeter by contrast, for it is at once associated with some inherent excellence which defied neglect. So with the happy pet, whose innate goodness cannot be spoiled by parental indulgence. By natural consequence of her rearing, Catharine was somewhat of a coquette. Start not! nor cross thyself, guileless reader, for thou art generous, and coquettes are a much abused race. What a brilliant world of song and loveliness, of sighs and smiles, of tears and thrilling tones, of wild reproach, sweet repentance, and eloquent sorrow are embodied in that single name of coquette! At once the delighted fancy pictures a superb and accomplished female luxuriating in the "purple light of love." The very name implies beauty, talent, and amiability; in that these alone win admiration, and by these only will gentlemen admit they are conquered. That wretched ambition, which pub licly displays the peacock's feathers, is not the intoxicating play upon hearts of a beautiful and polished woman. The first is the toy of vanity-the other, the innocent love of being loved-an evidence at once of overflowing kindness. This is the pleasing difference between the painted flirt and the witching, glorious creature who coquettes from conscious nobleness-claiming homage as the prerogative of her heavenly nature. If her smile is a lure, (sure it is a pious fraud to lead mortals to heaven!) it honestly shows the gilded barb, and adoring man takes it with a rapture which breathes, "'tis delicious to yield when angels tempt." Nothing in this world is half so harmless and unasking as love; emotion so gentle and so gratuitous, cannot fail to awaken a regard in its object, thus bringing into play commendable exercises of feeling. Females delight in the gentle charge of heartless coquette. Now, coquetry in a cottage proves at once that it is natural; and, zounds! who, in this christian age, will say that adored woman shall be rifled of her birthright? Rivalry is the soul of love, as jealousy is its test; and the real lover of a dashing coquette feels a delicious uncertainty which teaches him truly to value her. He must be a happy man, who is loved by one of these captivating beings; there must be-oh, there is an intensity of devotion in the love that prefers him to the world of its choice. Vanity-than which no feeling is more slandered and more disinterestedshares the giddy triumph. To think that she is the queen of hearts, and he the queen's king! Many may have heard the story of Oran al Bekar, who was the devil amongst women-a very prince of coquettes-and Zelire, his queen. They reclined in a nuptial bower, and the prince whispered"You are beautiful, Zelire, and love me; I am happy, for all men envy me," and he kissed his delighted bride. "You love me, Oran," murmured she, "and I am happy, for all women envy me." Can a prospect of domestic felicity be more flattering? To the belle in polished, or perhaps artificial society, coquetry is an armor of security-one of the acquired luxuries of society. Tears are a woman's weapons with her husband, sighs with her lover, but she must fight the cruel world with coquetry. There is less of the amiable weakness in the other sex, from lack of power; for, alas, they all would if they could, and do as they can. Where, then, is the credit of good motives for its condemnation by gentlemen? Ladies seldom cast the charge on one another. Star-gazers may have seen before now a gay, innocent-looking cloud suddenly darken and shoot forth lightning which it seemed too gentle to have harbored. So it was sometimes with Catharine Harman, To look on her faultless face, one would have never thought it passion's throne, yet she had that flavor of prettiness called "temper." There is something "interesting," highly so, in the female of holy placidity of disposition-one whose spirit glides unruffled along the calm tide of the ocean of life, and floats into port without a gun or a flag. How sweet, how heavenly!—yes, a little too much so for this world. That "interesting" is an equivocal compliment, at best. Give me the woman who has a leaven of mortality; a spirited girl, who will bridle up and argue, for nothing is so surpassingly delightful as the making up of a lovers' quarrel. A lake, sheltered by mountains, is very pretty, and all that, in its sweet repose; but who delights not more in the sea-the wild, majestic, beautiful, and laughing sea—which also has its hours of bewitching rest? Oh! the spice of variety! Well, Catharine, in addition to the sin of coquetry, had temper. Yet there was but one chord, waking but one tone, to but one touch. The untimely and mysterious end of her brother had wrought a perilous effect on her sensitive nature. Few feelings are so beautiful as a sister's love trusting as the dove in kindness returned, and, like the dove, unmurmuring in neglect. Its influence is holy and lasting; for few brothers of amiable sisters are ever unkind to the sex. But this theme is for gifted pens. Catharine Harman had loved her brother Charles with an intensity equalled only by its return. At the restless age of eighteen he had left his paternal roof with a hard wiung consent, and the first news of his wanderings was that he had fallen in a duel at New Orleans. Mourful is the grief for the wanderer whose eyes are closed by strangers' hands, for it has no consolation. It seems so hard to be robbed of the last look, the parting message, of those who are dear. Had his sister drunk his last sigh, and planted the willow on his youthful grave, tears had been a luxury; but as it was, memory had no farewell look or word to cheer its melancholy. The glad stream that has been dammed across, is slow and silent, yet at some time it will burst the barrier that gave it strength. As Catharine brooded over her brother's death, a new and powerful passion crept over her young heart-an unyielding abhorrence of duelling and duellists. This strong and absorbing feeling lit up disdain in her glance, and lent her tongue the withering eloquence of passion at the `name or sight of a duellist. Each blighting sarcasm was an expiation to the shade of her brother. At such moments, how different was she from the winning Catharine, the courteous and animated belle? Gifted, accomplished, and wealthy; at home in the graceful dance, or waking the melody of Euterpe from her harp; the light of the gay saloon, and the toast of the private circle; it was not wonderful that this brilliant favorite of nature should exercise the dangerous power of her inheritance. Many a conquered youth had knelt impassioned at the shrine of her beauty, and thought himself blessed with a tear of pity. The rich and powerful had courted her alliance; but, with the air of an empress, she answered, "My liberty is dearer than thou." But the fair Kate has been walking all this time in the grove by herself. She neared the skirt of the wood that sloped to a grassy bank, and flung its image on the tide. Leaning on the trunk of an ample oak, while the leaves of a pendent bough were wooing her lips and ringlets, she put on a poetical face, and gazed musingly on the water. The scene was brilliant and beautiful. Mysteriously charming it is to trace the landscape's shadow pencilled bright as its copy in the waveless tide. Fair earth is a vain baggage, and delights to take a peep at herself, as some pretty school girl, who carries a mirror in her bosom to dress her ringlets by. There, curiously inverted in that glorious bay, stood every quiet tree and yellow cliff, the setting sun, the anchored clouds, and the bandit fish-hawk watching still by his naked nest. It was nature sketching her own portrait from her looking glass. Far from the shore, hung dizzily between two heavens, sat a slight pilot schooner, raking true to her own weblike outline, on which she rested keel to keel. Here and there a stout bay craft was dozing on the crimson couch, and a thin column of smoke curled up amidships. At the distance of a mile, a gay looking ship, the palace of the cabin-king, appeared dotted with painted ports, and her sails and colors hanging sleeping in their pride. The sailor's favorite lay," the girl I left behind me," wandered from the rigging to the shore, plaintive as an unheard farewell. Far down, a long low point stole away into the channel, with its sentinel lighthouse stark at the end; and, beyond, the blue Chesapeake rolled his funeral tide till sky and sea were blended in the enchantment of distance. Around the embowered mansion a profusion of trees flung the mingled shade of the classic elm, the collonaded poplar, the whispering locust, and the lordly oak. Rows of white outhouses glanced among the foliage; and, around the neat negro quarters, troops of noisy young "tow heads" were gamboling with dogs of all degrees. Near by, an orchard of choice and various fruit was sending an odorous tribute to the sky; and a spacious garden on the southern wing, with its jetting fount, its silver rill, and vine-clad bower, its winding walks, and delicious shrubbery, spoke the culture of a refined and finished taste. From a flowering lawn to the bay, there stretched a beautiful grove of caks, the play ground of a pair of fawns, and the favorite stroll of their lovely mistress. It was a striking and animated picture of southern comfort and elegance. Over all, the setting sun brushed his burnished mantle, for he is a rare and skilful artist. The exquisite blending of ray and shade, the light in gay relief, and the mystic tints of the far blue hills, are each and all his patent of matchless artistry. That flow of soft delight which lovely scenery awakens in the gifted mind, stole over the lady as the floating serenade of the lute, and she murmured, "it is beautiful.” "The scene," answered a low and melodious voice," is insipid, for beauty is by comparison. An angel is an angel only on earth, in heaven she is but a woman. This scene is dull, for its charms have fled to deck a fairer shrine. Nature is jealous of you, peerless Catharine, as your music master was when his fair pupil excelled him." A graceful form of rounded eighteen was bending before her, and a sad and handsome face beamed upon the startled lady. She knew him not, and the stranger enjoyed her confusion with silent vanity for there is a singular delight in the incognito of one returning among his friends after an absence of years. No youth, especially at such a time, can bear to be saluted with familiar recognition. That careless "how are you? why you have not changed much," is chilling enough to the fancied unknown. A stare and a distant bow are the most subtle flattery-for vanity reads in them a change of personal appearance for the better of course. Thus it may have been in the present 2. VOL. V. NO. I. instance, and the youth looked at Catharine, as she thought, with provoking impudence-but then he was so handsome! "And I," again spoke the stranger, folding his arms, and bowing his head in eloquent melancholy, "have mused for years on that only balm of absence, remembrance of the loved, to find that I am forgotten. Would for his peace that Walter de Berrian were blessed with his cousin's forgetfulness." "Walter, Walter! my own dear cousin, I did not know you," exclaimed Catharine, quite taken by delightful surprise, as she extended her hand, and almost herself. In another moment she retired, sweetly confused, before the trembling and grateful gaze of the youth. The easy belle was abashed, and there was mischief in her soft confusion. The young man at her side was an orphan, under the guardianship of her father. Four years ago he left for college, a bashful stripling, whom his wild romping cousin had often kissed just to see him blush. She had read his letters, breathing a poetry of feeling which she could scarcely realize from the pen of the retiring Walter. But Catharine was flashing on her career of beauty and triumph, and seldom thought of her absent cousin, unless with a wonder of ideal interest. He stood beside her now an elegant gentleman, with thought upon his brow, and soul in his sad black eye-her equal in knowledge and mind-for a moment the change embarrassed her. "Your hand only !" ejaculated the young De Berrian, in strangely musical tone, as the blushing lady drew back. "This is a cold meeting-a slander to our heart. Why, my cousin, if we are glad to meet, should our joy be locked in this unmeaning shake? Why not take counsel of our feelings?" "I do," she answered, with a pretty curtesy. "We did not meet so once, Catharine, nor is this the greeting of kindred spirits-excuse me for complimenting myself." "Oh sir, since you are so disinterested, you are welcome to my share of the compliment. But what of our meetings once? I have'nt any memory; you know when I used to climb that cliff yonder for the flowers on its brink, while you were praying me to come down, I never looked behind, it made me giddy." "Ah it is true of all conquerors that they drown the cries of the wounded in the music of victory. But I meant, dearest cousin, that our hands formerly met after our lips-thinking they were safe in so innocent an example," returned Walter doubtfully. Why then," answered the laughing belle, "you were a sly pretty boy, and I, a little woman, for I had already broken some dozen of hearts, and worn as many miniatures. But now you have grown so tall and handsome, with such meaning in your eyes-I-you would not have your cousin kiss a man?" "No, loveliest girl! Never may that monster of beard and brutality wound my cousin's cherry lips. Reserve their dew and breath for the caress of thy softer sex and the warm touch of adoring boyhood. I am just eighteen," and, as the pleasing Walter spoke, his arm warily circled the round waist of the half-willing Catharine, and, amid slaps and stifled screams, he sought her averted lips. After a tantalizing chase, he snatched a lily hand from over the blushing fugitives, and printed upon them a long, delicious kiss. "How dare you sir ?" demanded Catharine, drawing up her pretty chin. "I am dying-my life is the forfeit of my rashness." "See what you have made of my hair, you impudent boy!" she said with a fatal glance, as she shook out the disordered tresses. The youth stood as if he had suddenly waked in the bower of a Peri: and well might the exquisite being before him have brought in question the reality of sight. The rich blood was planting roses in her superb cheeks, and through the splendid curls, that showered over her face, he saw a pouting lip and a witching eye. "Saint Mary!" whispered De Berrian, as if he feared to frighten the vision, "what crime, fairest exile, did you commit in Heaven?" “Theft sir,” she returned with a penitent sigh. "It is my only fault; I stole Cupid's arrows." "Then it is no mystery that they never wound yourself," said Walter, recovering his mortality. "Fatal huntress! now that the stolen quiver is nearly empty, in that you have more beaux than arrows, you kill with the more deadly artillery of your eyes. Such is the boasted progress of refinement. Yet spare a triumph so poor as I! Fire not from that murderous ambush again. The next glance will read the treasured secret of years," and his head fell mournfully upon his bosom. "Oh! is there a casket there that will hold a secret so long? Give it to me, my own kind cousin, and I won't look death at you again," and she leaned imploringly on his arm. "It is yours, my adored Catharine," he murmured low and passionately, "I love you." "Love me! I hope you do: I would not have a cousin that did not love me." She looked the sweetest surprise, and turned a demure face to the perplexed youth. 66 The Roguish counterfeit, and ridiculous me!" thought he, "I must pretend innocence too. surest lure for a butterfly is a painted rose." De Berrian had read much, seen much, and thought more. His fancy was rich, and his conversational powers of the first order. He adverted to the beautiful scenery around them, and, insensibly, Catharine was drawn from her perfection of sim plicity. Her gifted cousin was spreading a rare repast with a tasteful hand, and she partook with kindred enthusiasm. They descanted on the "beauties of nature," "painting," and "music," and wept over "poetry" and the "pothetics." The cousins were shining in a new and dazzling light. They were surprised at the extent of their powers, delighted with themselves, and with each other. Love, in the natural order of events, was the next theme, and they both seemed aware of the law, for Walter was trembling, and playing with an unsuspecting little hand, and Catharine gave her head the naive droop to one side, and looked delightfully simple. “To me,” said Walter with a speculative air, “it is inscrutable that actions and feelings should contradict each other. In this I am unblest, for my tongue is the confidant of my heart, which, as with your sex, means, that it keeps secrets by calling in assistance. Now, my cousin, I love you— see how my tongue betrays its faith-do you love me?" “Why what do you take me for, Walter? Do not the laws of heaven and earth command us to love our relatives?" Why will you not understand me?" he asked, with a passionate vehemence. "My love, beautiful woman, is not that calm, unanxious instinct of kindred. Oh! it is the freshest dew of the soul falling on its favorite rose! Catharine, we were children together, and the youngest tendril of the vine circles the nearest flower, and it never loosens its clasp for another." "Beautiful," she interrupted, with enthusiasm; "but the vine grows, puts forth other tendrils, and the youngest is first to decay, while the poor flower has long since perished in its withering clasp. Heaven save this frail flower from such keeping!" "But I don't want to die, dear. I'll tell you, skeptic-I named a wreath of flowers, "love," and threw it on the stream of isles in our garden. It floated gayly on, coquetting with every wave and bough, lingering a while on the golden sands of a flowered islet, and gliding away with a promise to come back. A fairer spot was ever in view-some far sweet isle, in the majesty of distance, witched the loitering voyager along, till the poor withered thing of vanity was stranded on a bubble. First love may be sincere while it lasts, but the same beauties of person and mind, by the same impulse, will charm in another. Absence conquers love by love's own weapons." "Thank you, sweet coz, for the lesson you teach; for, since my idol is the fairest and best, my faith will never be tempted." "Mine is not equally guarded," she rejoined laughing, " or rather I never loved. I don't believe in that lisping romance of the nursery. I have frailties enough." "Frailties!" said De Berrian shortly." I cannot understand that senseless affectation which can name the noblest passion in the gift of heaven a frailty. Yet listen, Catharine," he softened as he lip put on its haughtiness, “I know that you are kind and gentle as your fawns, for the child ne ver forgets the playmate of his cradle. Your boson thrills with sympathy at the tale of sorrow, and that liquid eye is lit with heaven's light when virtue triumphs. Surely love would sue to nestle in a heart like yours. Ah! there is a remembrance, sweet with the fragrance of other years, which bids me speak. Here, under these trees, we have woven the blue hare-bells together, and you have sportingly kissed me! O then, even then, I could have held your soft sweet lips to mine, and wished that moment eternity. Then I learned to adore you, and if there is one feeling unmixed with self, one trait that hallows frailty, it is the delicious love of early years, which blooms and smiles when the head is white, and the eye rayless. From birth my nature named you happiness, my honor was woven with you as glory, and my young ambition saw in you its heaven. Mine is the love that loves but once, and mine I offer thee." “Thank you,” answered the beauty, in a rapture of modesty. "How proud I am of my cousin— so eloquent, so tender. I am in torment to show my triumph." "Is this your answer?" demanded Walter, hastily. "What is the question, sir?" "Do you love me?" "That's not fair," she returned, sweetly; "do you love me?” "Oh! devotedly, my first and fairest," and he caught her hand. "Not so fast," she exclaimed, pretending surprise; "the first flowers of spring are fairest, and frailest, too. Your offer is painful and unexpected; speak of it no more." Yet Catharine felt proud, gratified at his long cherished affection, which, as a romping, teazing girl, she had slyly seen in a thousand adoring looks and silent rambles. As a lovely and winning belle, there lingered amid all her giddy triumphs a tender interest for her pensive cousin. His love she felt was a feeling tribute to her worth, and then he was a proud and portionless orphan. But. it would never do that the hunted coquette should be won so easily. She would not admit to herself that she loved him;. yet, as she stole a look at his faultless figure and handsome face, eloquent with vexation and disappointment, something whispered-" If ever I should love, my noble cousin will be the happy man.” [To be continued.] THEY CALL ME COLD AND PASSIONLESS. THEY call me cold and passionless-ah! little do they know But give to me for unison it holdeth with my soul— They call me cold and passionless-ah! little can they tell Beneath the mountain's cheerless side how many a spring may well, Give nurture to the waving grove, and blooming fragrance spread How many a flower of loveliness by nature's left alone, To add its sweetness to the air, from yonder cliff's high throne; They call me cold and passionless-because I will not bow To every lip where wreathed in smiles a subtle Cupid lies, Yet can I worship Woman with intensity of one Who feels her power, and boweth as the heathen to the sun- They call me cold and passionless-because they cannot read The thoughts that glow within my breast, in every heart gush thrill- And yet my soul resembles oft some cavern hidden deep E. G. K. |