497 

 THINGS THAT HAPPEN EVERY DAY. No. I. 



HANGING and marriage go by destiny. It was Edward Dacre' s des- 

 tiny not to hang, but in escaping the Charybdis of hemp, he fell into 

 the Scylla of matrimony. Men marry for love or money, saith the 

 general rule, but every rule hath its exceptions, and Dacre married for 

 neither. Love he did not feel, gain was out of the question. He wished 

 to be generous, and surrendered his own happiness to ensure that of a 

 woman he pitied, but could not esteem. He was a mere boy, and knew 

 less of the world than a youth bred in Saturn or the Pleiades. Women 

 he believed to be angels ; deceit their abhorrence, and truth the idol of 

 their constant thoughts. His mother was purity of mind personified, 

 his sisters artless as before the fall; and he concluded that the rest of the 

 sex differed from them only in name, person, or complexion. Their 

 " yea" he knew to be " yea," their " nay," " nay ;" and sooner than 

 dream of falsehood from a female tongue, he would have listened for 

 thunder from a lute, or discord in the spheres. He had the knowledge 

 of good, but half the fruit remained uneaten. The knowledge of evil 

 does not desolate the heart till man bites the pippin to the core. 



Foggy November clouded the earth, the mist hung over the brook, 

 the wind came shivering from the north, and blew the withering leaves 

 along the aisle, as Dacre entered the church where his earthly doom was 

 to be sealed for ever. The martyr is ever punctual at the stake ; and 

 long ere the priest appeared, Dacre and the partner of his life stood 

 before the altar. He closed his eyes, and leant forward in deep reverie. 

 He thought he stood on a fair eminence, lit with the gay beams of the 

 morning sun. Beneath him spread a gloomy valley, filled with melan- 

 choly caves and drooping trees. A river, cold and sluggish, strayed 

 along the vale, and bore upon its bosom a shattered boat. A silent 

 figure sat within the barque, and, sunk in gloomy thought, appeared to 

 wait with patient grief the slowness of the voyage. Far as the eye could 

 reach, the sombre valley seemed to stretch, till distance veiled it from 

 the sight. Dacre shuddered. The huge door of the church banged 

 like thunder, the vision fled and the curate whisked up to the altar, 

 and muttered the fatal spell. 



'Twas done irrevocablyfdone ! Was the bride beautiful, or young, or 

 rich? of noble birth, or lofty mind, or spotless fame? Alas ! how ter- 

 rible is truth how eloquent is silence ! Swift is the passing of a year 

 over the heads of the young and happy. Summer comes again before 

 they think it cold, and, wandering on the virgin turf, they listen to the 

 birds, whose merry music seems the lingering echo of their last year's 

 song. 



But to the dreary and forlorn, how slowly cruel is the lapse of time. 

 Philosophers and moralists may say what they please, a man can break 

 his heart, but he cannot force it to love. Long before the anniversary 

 of his wedding, Edmund Dacre found the bitter truth of this assertion. 

 His heart was formed for love love, not like the summer's noon, as 

 fierce as quickly passing,- but soft and lingering as the twilight hour, 

 dying, yet living vanishing, yet for ever there. It was that love in 

 which intellect mingles with sentiment calm, yet generous chaste, 

 yet glowing as the sunset of an autumn sky. His mind was Cultivated 

 M. M. No. 83. 2 L 



