The Buccaneer - A Tale

Down, stormy Passions, down; no more

Let your rude waves invade the shore

Where blushing Reason sits, and hides

Her from the fury of your tides.

* * * * * * *

Fall, easy Patience, fall like rest,

Where soft spells charm a troubled breast.

HENRY KING

We believe that even those who are anxious to learn if the Protector

travelled in safety to his place of destination, and what he did when he

arrived there, will scarcely murmur at the delay which a brief visit to

Constantia Cecil will necessarily occasion.

We must not leave her alone in her sorrow, which, of a truth, was hard

to bear. A temporary respite had been afforded her by the terrible

events of the evening; it was, however, a respite that was likely, in

her case, only to bring about a more fatal termination. What was to

prevent Sir Willmott Burrell from branding her father--from publishing

his crime, now that he was to receive no benefit by the terrible secret

of which he had become possessed? Although she might be preserved from

the dreadful and dreaded doom of marrying a man she could neither regard

nor respect, it was equally certain that an eternal barrier existed

between her and the only one she loved--a barrier which not even the

power of Cromwell could break down or remove. It has been said, and said

truly, that there are few things reason can discover with so much

certainty and ease as its own deficiency. Constantia was a reasoning

being, and she appeared ever placid in situations where her fine mind

was overwhelmed by a painful train of circumstances over which she had

no control: the sins for which she suffered were not of her own

committing.

She had often gloried in days past at the prospect of fame--the honest,

upright fame which appeared the guiding principle that influenced her

father's actions, when the seeking after glory seemed to her as a

ferment thrown into his blood to work it up to action; and though she

sometimes apprehended that he used his will with his right hand and his

reason with his left, she never imagined the possibility that his pomp

was furnished by injustice and his wealth dyed in blood. It was, in

truth, a fearful knowledge she had acquired--a knowledge she could not

communicate, and upon which she could never take advice. Her misery was

to be endured not only with patience, but in secret and without

complaint. That destiny was indeed severe which compelled her to

anticipate a meeting with Walter as the greatest evil which could befall

her; yet ardently did her soul yearn to know his fate. She sat by her

father on the first night of his affliction, and on the long, long day

that followed, guarding him through his dreadful malady with the

watchfulness of a most devoted child, and the skilfulnes of a most wise

physician. Almost every word he uttered was as a dagger to her heart;

yet she saw and knew the necessity that must soon exist for others to

hear him speak, and shuddered at the thought.