The Buccaneer - A Tale
Page 290"Then Barbara, whose blood was streaming from her wound, sprang to my
bosom--sweet girl!--and hung, as I thought, a corpse upon my arm. When I
looked upon her pallid cheeks and livid lips, I could have braved a
thousand deaths sooner than have left her to be buried in their black
and filthy clay; and I spoke from my heart to them, and I think Lady
Constantia spoke too; and they let us pass, me and my dead child!
"I carried her round the chapel, and sank with her into the vault, where
I had been concealed--that which contains the passage leading up to
Minster, and then sloping down the hill; and I placed my daughter on the
ground and closed the entrance, as we have ever done. And then I sat on
the earth and raised her head and shoulders on my knees, and loosening
her kerchief to look at the wound, which I had no doubt had been
inflicted by the Jewess Zillah--shall I ever forget the sensation!--I
cannot describe it, so different from anything I ever felt--ever can
feel:--her bosom was warm, as the fleece of a young unshorn lamb, and
her heart palpitated within it." The rugged Buccaneer covered his face
with his hands, and Robin, in a voice which strong emotion rendered
almost inarticulate, said,---"I know what must have been your feelings from what I myself felt so
short a time past."
Hugh Dalton slowly withdrew his broad palms from his countenance, and
love my daughter, I have seen but too plainly; and I take it ill that
you told me not of it before." Robin would have interrupted,--but he
motioned him to remain silent. "We will talk of it hereafter;--only
this--you may love her, but you cannot love her with a parent's love. It
is as deep as it is mysterious; it comes with the first look a father
casts upon his babe; the infant, which to the whole world seems a
mis-shapen, an unpleasant thing to look upon, to him is a being of most
perfect beauty--the hope--the prop--the stay of his future life. Upon
that weak, helpless, inanimate creature, his heart leans--the heart of
the strongest man leans upon it. The world holds out no promise to tempt
him like the well-doing of his child. It is a wonderful mystery,"
continued the Buccaneer, reverently uncovering his head, as men do when
they are about to enter a place of worship; "it is most wonderful, the
holy love which comes upon us, for the simple, senseless, powerless
things, that fill us with so much hope, and strength, and energy! I saw
a whale once, who, when her young one was struck by the harpoon, came
right between it and the ship, and bore the blows, and took the fatal
weapons again and again into her bleeding body; and when she was
struggling in her flurry, and the sea around was dyed as red as scarlet,
over it. It was the very time that I was bringing my own girl to
England--a little creature, sleeping in my bosom--and it was by a vessel
in our company the poor whale was killed; for I would not suffer one of
my men to have a hand in such a sickening job:--but I never forgot
it--never--how she lay over her young, shielding it to the last with her
own body! I used to pray--I could pray whenever I took my Barbara into
my arms!--I thought it a duty then to pray for her, and I trusted that
she would hereafter pray for me. Had I always her sweet face to look
upon, I should be free from many a crime!--It is a beautiful mystery, I
say again; and no one but myself, young man, can ever tell what I felt
when I knew that she was yet alive! As soon as I had sufficiently
collected my senses, I examined the wound. Often had I looked on blood;
and wounds were familiar to me, as blackberries to a schoolboy; but I
trembled from head to foot, as if I had never seen either. The ball had
made its own way out under the shoulder; and, as consciousness was fast
returning, I endeavoured to staunch the stream, which flowed so
copiously that I began to dread the destruction of my newly raised
hopes. While I was thus occupied, I heard so deeply drawn a sigh from
some one close to me, that I started back, and was horrified at seeing
by my side. I cursed her with a wicked curse, and was about to inflict
instant, but most unjust punishment. The unfortunate creature prostrated
herself at my feet, and explained, as briefly as her sobs permitted,
that, enraged at Burrell's treachery--finding herself deserted by
Fleetword, whose faith she relied upon--imagining that Mistress Cecil
was leagued against her, from the circumstance of her never taking
notice of the communications she wrote and confided to Jeromio's
care--wrought up, in fact, to a pitch of frenzy, she determined on
destroying Burrell's destined bride, whose appearance she had
confounded with that of my poor Barbara! Nothing could exceed her
penitence. She had groped her way to the secret entrance into the tomb.
It had been revealed to her by the traitor Jeromio. She returned with us
after nightfall to this horrid place; and has ever since watched my poor
child with the earnestness and care of a most devoted sister. I am
astonished how she escaped Sir Willmott's vengeance. He was so hemmed in
by difficulties, that he had no power to act, though he tried hard for
it. The villain Jeromio----"