As to women, he had once already been drawn headlong by impetuous

folly, which he meant to be final, since marriage at some distant

period would of course not be impetuous. For those who want to be

acquainted with Lydgate it will be good to know what was that case of

impetuous folly, for it may stand as an example of the fitful swerving

of passion to which he was prone, together with the chivalrous kindness

which helped to make him morally lovable. The story can be told

without many words. It happened when he was studying in Paris, and

just at the time when, over and above his other work, he was occupied

with some galvanic experiments. One evening, tired with his

experimenting, and not being able to elicit the facts he needed, he

left his frogs and rabbits to some repose under their trying and

mysterious dispensation of unexplained shocks, and went to finish his

evening at the theatre of the Porte Saint Martin, where there was a

melodrama which he had already seen several times; attracted, not by

the ingenious work of the collaborating authors, but by an actress

whose part it was to stab her lover, mistaking him for the

evil-designing duke of the piece. Lydgate was in love with this

actress, as a man is in love with a woman whom he never expects to

speak to. She was a Provencale, with dark eyes, a Greek profile, and

rounded majestic form, having that sort of beauty which carries a sweet

matronliness even in youth, and her voice was a soft cooing. She had

but lately come to Paris, and bore a virtuous reputation, her husband

acting with her as the unfortunate lover. It was her acting which was

"no better than it should be," but the public was satisfied. Lydgate's

only relaxation now was to go and look at this woman, just as he might

have thrown himself under the breath of the sweet south on a bank of

violets for a while, without prejudice to his galvanism, to which he

would presently return. But this evening the old drama had a new

catastrophe. At the moment when the heroine was to act the stabbing of

her lover, and he was to fall gracefully, the wife veritably stabbed

her husband, who fell as death willed. A wild shriek pierced the

house, and the Provencale fell swooning: a shriek and a swoon were

demanded by the play, but the swooning too was real this time. Lydgate

leaped and climbed, he hardly knew how, on to the stage, and was active

in help, making the acquaintance of his heroine by finding a contusion

on her head and lifting her gently in his arms. Paris rang with the

story of this death:--was it a murder? Some of the actress's warmest

admirers were inclined to believe in her guilt, and liked her the

better for it (such was the taste of those times); but Lydgate was not

one of these. He vehemently contended for her innocence, and the

remote impersonal passion for her beauty which he had felt before, had

passed now into personal devotion, and tender thought of her lot. The

notion of murder was absurd: no motive was discoverable, the young

couple being understood to dote on each other; and it was not

unprecedented that an accidental slip of the foot should have brought

these grave consequences. The legal investigation ended in Madame

Laure's release. Lydgate by this time had had many interviews with

her, and found her more and more adorable. She talked little; but that

was an additional charm. She was melancholy, and seemed grateful; her

presence was enough, like that of the evening light. Lydgate was madly

anxious about her affection, and jealous lest any other man than

himself should win it and ask her to marry him. But instead of

reopening her engagement at the Porte Saint Martin, where she would

have been all the more popular for the fatal episode, she left Paris

without warning, forsaking her little court of admirers. Perhaps no

one carried inquiry far except Lydgate, who felt that all science had

come to a stand-still while he imagined the unhappy Laure, stricken by

ever-wandering sorrow, herself wandering, and finding no faithful

comforter. Hidden actresses, however, are not so difficult to find as

some other hidden facts, and it was not long before Lydgate gathered

indications that Laure had taken the route to Lyons. He found her at

last acting with great success at Avignon under the same name, looking

more majestic than ever as a forsaken wife carrying her child in her

arms. He spoke to her after the play, was received with the usual

quietude which seemed to him beautiful as clear depths of water, and

obtained leave to visit her the next day; when he was bent on telling

her that he adored her, and on asking her to marry him. He knew that

this was like the sudden impulse of a madman--incongruous even with his

habitual foibles. No matter! It was the one thing which he was

resolved to do. He had two selves within him apparently, and they must

learn to accommodate each other and bear reciprocal impediments.

Strange, that some of us, with quick alternate vision, see beyond our

infatuations, and even while we rave on the heights, behold the wide

plain where our persistent self pauses and awaits us.




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