Why should we wander in the fields
of fiction, to cull fancy’s flowers to feast
a morbid imagination, when there are so many thrilling
incidents in the pathway of human life, calculated
to awaken the most refined emotions, and stir the
deepest currents of the human soul? Would the
painter, as he raised his brush to give the last finishing
touch to his picture, draw his colors from fancy?
Would he not rather imitate the color of the natural
rose, copy the forest green, the azure of the sky,
or the brilliant hues of the rainbow, as it spans
the heavens with its bow of promise?
Fiction may weave her intricate labyrinths
and enchain the fancy by wandering in mazy circuits,
and weaving her mystic web; but truth will stand in
all its primitive lustre, when the foundations of this
earth have passed away. Then let me record the
truth in preference to fiction.
The clouds hung in heavy dense masses,
during the day, while a damp chilly wind from the
north-east betokened an uncomfortable winter rain.
It was winter, although the bridge of ice that had
been formed over the Blackstone was broken up, and
floated on its surface in huge masses, as it hurried
rapidly along, to empty them into the waters of the
Narragansett Bay, reminding the thoughtful observer
of the stream of time, bearing away its vast multitudes
to the ocean of eternity.
Here, where now stands our beautiful
village, a few short years since stood the dense forest the
growth of centuries. Here the rude Indian roamed,
in native wildness, hunted his prey, built his council
fire, or smoked his pipe of peace. Here, where
now stands the temple of the living God, with its
heaven directed spire, perchance smoked the blood
of some poor victim, as it was offered upon the altar
of savage brutality; or the rude wigwam stood.
But all these things have passed,
as a tale that is told. They have floated down
the current of time, even like the broken masses of
ice that are borne so rapidly down our river, and
have passed into the broad ocean of eternity.
On the banks of that stream, where
the pale face first crossed to hold a council with
his red brethren, stands a flourishing village, reared
by the hand of civilization, and offering many facilities
to the industry of its virtuous and well disposed
inhabitants. It would be pleasant to tell a tale
of the times of old, of the deeds of the days of other
years, of the Indian that paddled his light canoe upon
our river; but this is not the purport of the story.
It is to scan the different scenes
as they lay spread out before us, upon the map of
busy life. The day had closed, dark, dreary and
cheerless. The rain and sleet were driven furiously
before the wind, and the child of want shrank from
the biting blast, as stern necessity drove him forth
to meet the peltings of the winter storm.
There was a social gathering at a
large, elegantly finished and furnished hall, splendidly
illuminated with its brilliant gas lights, diffusing
a lustre upon gorgeous trappings with which they were
surmounted.
The streets resounded with the rattling
wheels of omnibusses, cabs and various vehicles, as
they bore the gay and fashionable part of the village
to the splendid hall.
Soft music charmed the ear, and floated
in sweet melody through the apartment. Beauty
was there, with rosy cheek and brilliant eye.
Fashion displayed her most tasteful arrangements, and
each one seemed vieing with the other in elegance
of costume. All looked like the enchanting scenes
pictured in fairy tales, and one might almost suppose
Alladin’s wonderful lamp was still extant, performing
its mysterious spells, and casting a supernatural
lustre over the gay group that assembled, to dissipate
the cheerless gloom that reigned without, by mirth
and hilarity. And they joined in the mazy dance,
and spent the hours of night in joyous revelry.
A sumptuous entertainment was prepared, and everything
provided to satisfy the votaries of pleasure.
But as the lively music sounded from
that splendid hall, it stole upon the
“Cold, dull ear of death,”
for, but a few rods distant, lay a
female, little passed the meridian of life (who had
lived in the same village, and trod in the pathway
of life with them many years), wrapped in the shroud
of death, and next day to be borne away to the tomb,
and shut out forever from all the scenes where she
had once been an actress. But now she would look
out upon the world no more. Her eyes were closed
in death, and her ear heard not the wild music that
was stealing through her otherwise silent chamber.
All of earth had passed from her vision.
Life, with its stern, cold realities, or its light
toned revelry, could awaken no response in her inanimate
form.
A brother had been summoned from a
distant village to attend her funeral. He had
travelled, notwithstanding the inclemency of the weather,
and when the shades of twilight fell over the earth,
he stood by that dearly loved form. Memory brought
back the past. That cold, pulseless one was a
child again, sporting by his side, prattling upon
his knee, and winning attention by the ten thousand
witcheries of childhood.
Then, with the rapidity of thought,
blooming youth succeeded this age, and she stood,
blushing in maiden modesty, the gay young sister of
other days; and his heart was filled with sadness as
he gazed upon her stiff in the icy arms of death,
and felt that she could no more return his affection.
He was an aged man, and knew much of the sorrow and
the trials of life; he turned, with a tear in his eye,
from his loved sister and passed into the street.
The storm was increasing, but he heeded
not the peltings of the wintry wind, or the wild music
that mingled with its mournful wail, as he passed
the luxurious hall, where
“Fashion’s gay tapers were
lighted.”
Other thoughts occupied his mind.
He soon stood by the bedside of a
dear daughter, who was passing away from earth, while
yet in the bloom and the beauty of youth. She
was a wife, and a mother of two sweet children, whose
tender age required a mother’s watchfulness a
mother’s care. But with childlike trust,
she had given them back to that God, who had given
them to her. Her trust was in him, and now she
was ready to follow her dear Saviour into the cold
dark grave, with the assurance that she should have
a part in the first resurrection. Melancholy
sounded the music from that distant ball room, as
it stole upon the wings of the winter wind, into the
chamber of the dying one. Her ear was listening
to catch the notes of angel harps before the throne
of God, and her passing spirit was attuned to their
melodies. The beauties of the upper world transfixed
her rapt vision, and no earthly object stood between
her soul and God. And so she passed away, and
left to her earthly friends but the frail casket,
while the priceless jewel had soared to brighter regions,
to glitter in a Saviour’s crown.
The father had come just in time to
take the last look of his living child, to hear her
last words, to witness her last struggle, as the pure
spirit departed from earth, to join her sainted mother
in the spirit land. He was taking another portion
from the cup of affliction, which however bitter to
the taste, often sweetens the journey of human life,
preparing the recipient better to perform its duties,
and bear its trials.
As the stricken father retired to
bed, the sound of revelry fell heavily upon an almost
bursting heart.
And the dear children, could they
listen to its glad strain? O, no; they had seen
death cast his marble paleness upon their mother’s
face; had felt the icy coldness of her pulseness limbs;
had called her by the endearing name of mother, and
her pale lips answered not, and they had retired with
eyes red with weeping; they as yet knew nothing of
the extent of their bereavement. The husband,
too, had lost the companion of his youth, the mother
of his children, and although he possessed like precious
faith with her, and kissed the rod with pious resignation;
still they were a grief-stricken household, and presented
a striking contrast to the gay group that were dancing
thoughtlessly away the hours of that solemn night,
while the recording angel was taking note of all that
was passing beneath his all-seeing eye, in that book
that shall be opened when we shall all stand before
God, to be judged according to the deeds done in the
body.
The music floated on and reached the
ear of a poor maniac as he sat by his comfortable
fire, listening to the monotonous roar of the distant
water fall, and the howling of the wintry winds, as
it came surging on, waving the leafless tree and pelting
the falling rain against the windows.
“Hark!” said he, springing
up, “the bees are swarming; I shall be stung
to death,” and out he rushed, with a brighter
fire in his eye and a more intense one in his brain.
Descending the hill, he watched the sylph like forms
as they floated on in the mazy dance, declaring the
bees were in terrible commotion, and he should be stung
to death. With difficulty he was prevailed upon
to return to his house, and ever and anon, as the
sound of the music reached his ear, he would start
and affirm that the bees surely were swarming.
Such is man, the noblest work of God,
when bereft of reason to guide and direct him.
Still farther on were young parents
keeping anxious watch over a sick infant, whose feeble
thread of life seemed trembling upon a very hair.
The doctor had said there was no hope; kind, sympathizing
friends, as they looked on the sufferings of the dear
babe with tearful eyes, had said, there is no hope;
and the agonized hearts of the parents echoed back,
no hope. But still they did hope. The breath
came heavily from the heaving chest, and the blue
orbs looked dimly from their half closed lids, while
the little sufferer, with burning hand and parched
lip, seemed struggling for that life that it had enjoyed
but for so brief a space. The parents were young
in years and unacquainted with sorrow, and very dear
to their loving hearts was the sick infant. They
felt they could not part with the dear one. Carefully
they nursed the flickering lamp of life: through
that dreary winter night, lest some ruder blast should
extinguish it forever. Wished they to join the
thoughtless throng in the tinselled hall of fashion?
O, no, they had rather count the fluttering pulses
of their dear boy, cool his fevered brow, and administer
the reviving cordial through the weary hours of the
night, than to listen to sweetest strains of Orpheus’
harp, or thread the winding mazes of the giddy dance.
And so with them the night wore away,
the long dark night of suffering to the babe, and
watchful anxiety to the parents. But the angel
of death that had hovered so long over the darling
babe, unfurled his sable pinions and flew away in
search of another victim, and he is spared yet a little
longer.
Pursuing the way a little farther
in another direction, you find another weary watcher
by the midnight lamp. An aged woman, who has
lived her three score years and ten, sits bolstered
up in her chair, toiling for her little remaining
sum of existence, which nature seems unwilling to
relinquish, although subsisting now upon borrowed time.
From an adjoining room comes a frequent hollow cough,
and the sunken eye and emaciated frame of the poor
girl betray the secret foe, lurking in the hidden
springs of life.
Death is no stranger beneath this
roof. He has borne away one after another from
this numerous household, and laid them down side by
side in the silent grave. And now his darts seem
aimed at the two only ones of that household, the
mother and her daughter. The sons are married
and have families of their own, but the mother and
this daughter live alone in the home of her youth,
the very place, perchance, where she was brought a
gay and expecting bride by that husband she is expecting
now to follow so soon to the spirit world. Could
the pleasures or the gaities of the world cast one
cheering beam upon their lonely home? O, no,
the religion of Jesus alone can illuminate their benighted
hearts, and in “this light they see light,”
and feel prepared to go when the summons comes.
Following the street, you pass the
door of a daughter who is weeping for the recent loss
of a mother, who passes suddenly away without a moment’s
warning, and a widow who mourns a husband, cut off
by lingering disease.
A few steps and we reach a cottage,
where other parents were watching over a little son
of five years, who is wasting away with consumption.
His attenuated limbs bear his little frame but feebly,
and he often talks of death, for he has recently seen
a little sister younger than himself fall a prey to
the fearful malady. A burning fever is raging
in his veins, and lights up his eye with unwonted brilliancy,
as he tossed restlessly from side to side upon his
pillow. His silken hair of beautiful brown is
brushed smoothly back from his high, marble forehead,
while gentle hands apply the cooling bath, to still
if possible, its tumultuous throbbings, and he murmurs
of sweet sister and of heaven. Soft words of
love are whispered in his ear, and he is told of the
Lamb of God that bids little children to come unto
him.
And thought not these weary watchers
of that lonely night, of the revellers in that distant
hall? Methinks their hearts went up in fervent
prayer to God that he would spare them yet a little
longer, for there were immortal souls there, for whom
he labored and prayed, who entered the sanctuary and
heard the word of God as it fell from his lips, Sabbath
after Sabbath, and he felt sensibly that the midnight
revel would not prepare the heart to seek God, or make
the necessary preparation for death. Towards
morning the eyes of the little sufferer closed in
uneasy slumber, and the parents too, were refreshed
by a short interval of sleep.
Passing yet in another direction was
a tall youth, with a subdued expression of countenance,
hurrying on, in spite of wind and rain, to the doctor’s
office, to procure assistance for a sick mother, who
was tossing in all the agony of brain fever.
The doctor had been called away to visit a little
child that had a sudden attack of the croup, that
fearful disease that bears so many children to the
tomb. He returned again with a sorrowing heart.
Heeded he the sweet tones of music that fell upon
his youthful ear? wished he to join the gay group
as they flitted before the brilliantly lighted, window,
and the fairy forms of the fashionable, and the pleasure-seeking
met his eye? O, no; there was sorrow in his young
heart, and sorrow brooded over the household.
Towards midnight the doctor came, and a young daughter,
younger than many who graced the festive ball, following
his directions, alleviated the sufferings of a sick
mother, and wore the weary night away in anxious watchings.
Not till another day dawned, did the
rumbling of the carriages cease, that were conveying
home the sons and daughters of dissipation. And
thus passed the night, leaving no trace upon earth,
for the waves of time have obliterated all its footprints.
But its record is on high, and it will never be forgotten
by the Eternal One, whose eye slumbereth not.
Such is human life, and such is the
race of man. Although we are all bound together
by one common brotherhood, the song of the gay is ever
the funeral dirge to the sorrowing.
Perchance that night might have disclosed
still darker pictures in the hidden recesses of our
village, for, oh, there are dens of foul pollution,
that send their infectious taint over the pure air
of our community, calling the blush of shame to the
cheek of conscious virtue, and creating an ardent
desire in the breast of the philanthropist, to go
forth and labor in the vineyard of the Lord, that
these foul spots may be washed in his precious blood,
and made clean.
O, could all the misery that was extant
in the village have been presented to the thoughtless
revellers, could they have danced on? Would not
the tear of sympathy have moistened the cheek, and
the still small voice whispered of a solemn time that
must come to them? O, it is wise to receive the
admonition, “Be ye also ready, for in such an
hour as ye think not, the Son of Man cometh.”
Faint, indeed, are the delineations
from Memory’s tablet, upon this little map,
but enough, perchance, to lead the contemplative mind
to reflect upon the vicissitudes and changes of its
little day, and teach us to prepare for a better world,
“where change comes not.”