curl here and there to the tresses, a deeper tinge to the shadow of the lash under the azured eyelid. I was absorbed in the execution of these nice details, when, after one rapid tap, my door unclosed, admitting St John Rivers.
‘I am come to see how you are spending your holiday,’ he said. ‘Not, I hope, in thought? No, that is well: while you draw you will not feel lonely. You see, I mistrust you still, though you have borne up wonderfully so far. I have brought you a book for evening solace,’ and he laid on the table a new publication – a poem: one of those genuine productions so often vouchsafed to the fortunate public of those days – the golden age of modern literature. Alas! the readers of our era are less favoured. But courage! I will not pause either to accuse or repine. I know poetry is not dead, nor genius lost; nor has Mammon gained power over either, to bind or slay; they will both assert their existence, their presence, their liberty and strength again one day. Powerful angels, safe in heaven! they smile when sordid souls triumph, and feeble ones weep over their destruction. Poetry destroyed? Genius banished? No! Mediocrity, no: do not let envy prompt you to the thought. No; they not only live, but reign and redeem: and without their divine influence spread everywhere, you would be in hell – the hell of your own meanness.
While I was eagerly glancing at the bright pages of ‘Marmion’6 (for ‘Marmion’ it was), St John stooped to examine my drawing. His tall figure sprang erect again with a start: he said nothing. I looked up at him: he shunned my eye. I knew his thoughts well, and could read his heart plainly; at the moment I felt calmer and cooler than he: I had then temporarily the advantage of him, and I conceived an inclination to do him some good, if I could.
‘With all his firmness and self-control,’ thought I, ‘he tasks himself too far: locks every feeling and pang within – expresses, confesses, imparts nothing. I am sure it would benefit him to talk a little about this sweet Rosamond, whom he thinks he ought not to marry: I will make him talk.’
I said first, ‘Take a chair, Mr Rivers.’ But he answered, as he always did, that he could not stay. ‘Very well,’ I responded mentally, ‘stand if you like; but you shall not go just yet, I am determined: solitude is at least as bad for you as it is for me. I’ll try if I cannot discover the secret spring of your confidence, and find an aperture in that marble breast through which I can shed one drop of the balm of sympathy.’
‘Is this portrait like?’ I asked bluntly.
‘Like! Like whom? I did not observe it closely.’
‘You did, Mr Rivers.’
He almost started at my sudden and strange abruptness: he looked at me astonished. ‘Oh, that is nothing yet,’ I muttered within. ‘I don’t mean to be baffled by a little stiffness on your part; I’m prepared to go to considerable lengths.’ I continued, ‘You observed it closely and distinctly; but I have no objection to your looking at it again,’ and I rose and placed it in his hand.
‘A well-executed picture,’ he said; ‘very soft, clear colouring; very graceful and correct drawing.’
‘Yes, yes; I know all that. But what of the resemblance? Who is it like?’
Mastering some hesitation, he answered, ‘Miss Oliver, I presume.’
‘Of course. And now, sir, to reward you for the accurate guess, I will promise to paint you a careful and faithful duplicate of this very picture, provided you admit that the gift would be acceptable to you. I don’t wish to throw away my time and trouble on an offering you would deem worthless.’
He continued to gaze at the picture: the longer he looked, the firmer he held it, the more he seemed to covet it. ‘It is like!’ he murmured; ‘the eye is well managed: the colour, light, expression, are perfect. It smiles!’
‘Would it comfort, or would it wound you to have a similar painting? Tell me that. When you are at Madagascar, or at the Cape, or in India, would it be a consolation to have that memento in your possession? or would the sight of it bring recollections calculated to enervate and distress?’
He now furtively raised his eyes: he glanced at me, irresolute, disturbed: he again surveyed the picture.