adversary to their affection; but with him Fortune was in league, and the course of true love never long runs smooth.
The father of Isabella was one of those unfortunate lairds who embarked in the Mississippian project of the Ayr Bank, the inevitable fate of which, at the very moment when the hopes of the lovers were as gay as the apple boughs with blossoms in the first fine mornings of spring, came like a nipping frost, and blighted their happiness for ever. Fatherlans was ruined, and his ruin was a sufficient reason, with the inflexible Claud, to command Charles to renounce all thoughts of that fond connexion which he had himself considered as the most enviable which his son could hope to obtain. But the altered fortunes of Isabella only served to endear her more and more to her lover; and the interdict of his father was felt as a profane interference with that hallowed enthusiasm of mingled love and sorrow with which his breast was at the moment filled.
‘It is impossible,’ said he; ‘and even were it in my power to submit to the sacrifice you require, honour, and every sentiment that makes life worthy, would forbid me. No, sir; I feel that Isabella and I are one; Heaven has made us so, and no human interposition can separate minds which God and Nature have so truly united. The very reason that you urge against the continuance of my attachment, is the strongest argument to make me cherish it with greater devotion than ever. You tell me she is poor, and must be penniless. Is not that, sir, telling me that she has claims upon my compassion as well as on my love? You say her father must be driven to the door. Gracious Heaven! and in such a time shall I shun Isabella? A common stranger, one that I had never before known, would, in such adversity and distress, be entitled to any asylum I could offer; but Isabella—in the storm that has unroofed her father’s house—shall she not claim that shelter which, by so many vows, I have sworn to extend over her through life?’
‘Weel, weel, Charlie,’ replied the old man, ‘rant awa, and tak thy tocherless bargain to thee, and see what thou’ll mak o’t. But mind my words—when Poverty comes in at the door, Love jumps out at the window.’
‘It is true,’ said the lover, a little more calmly, ‘that we cannot hope to live in such circumstances as I had so often reason to expect; but still, you will not refuse to take me into partnership, which, in the better days of her father, you so often promised?’
‘We’ll hae twa words about that,’ replied the father; ‘it’s ae thing to take in a partner young, clever, and sharp, and another to take a needful man with the prospect o’ a family. But, Charlie, I’ll no draw back in my word to you, if ye’ll just put off for a year or twa this calf-love connexion. Maybe by and by ye’ll think better o’ my counsel; at ony rate, something for a sair foot may be gathered in the meantime; and neither you nor Bell Fatherlans are sae auld but ye can afford to bide a while.’
This was said in the old man’s most reflective and sedate manner, and after some further conversation, Charles did consent to postpone for that time his marriage, on condition of being immediately admitted into partnership, with an understanding, that he should be free to marry at the end of twelve months, if he still continued so inclined. Both parties in this arrangement calculated without their host. The father thought that the necessary change in the exterior circumstances of Isabella would, in the course of the year, have a tendency to abate the ardour of her lover, and the son gave too much credit to his own self-denial, supposing, that, although the ruin of Fatherlans was declared, yet, as in similar cases, twelve months would probably elapse before the sequestration and sale of his estate would finally reduce the condition of his family. From the moment, however, that the affairs of the banking company were found irretrievable, Mr. Fatherlans zealously bestirred himself to place his daughter above the hazards of want, even while he entertained the hope that it might not be necessary. He carried her with him to Glasgow, and, before calling at Claud’s shop, secured for her an asylum in the house of Miss Mally Trimmings, a celebrated mantua-maker of that time. When he afterwards waited on the inexorable pedlar, and communicated the circumstance, the latter, with unfeigned pleasure, commended the prudence of the measure, for he anticipated that the pride of his son would recoil at the idea of connecting himself with Isabella in her altered state. What the lover himself felt on hearing the news, we shall not attempt to describe, nor shall we so far intrude beyond the veil which should ever be drawn over the anxieties and the sorrows of young affection, under darkened prospects, as to relate what passed between the lovers when they next met. The resolution, however, with which they both separated, was worthy of the purity of their mutual affections, and they agreed to pass the probationary year in a cheerful submission to their lot.
CHAPTER XV
When Charles parted from Isabella, he returned thoughtfully towards Grippy, which was situated on the south side of the Clyde, at the foot of the Cathkin hills. His road, after passing the bridge, lay across the fields as far as Rutherglen, where it diverged towards the higher ground, commanding at every winding a rich and variegated prospect.
The year was waning into autumn, and the sun setting in all that effulgence of glory, with which, in a serene evening, he commonly at that season terminates his daily course behind the distant mountains of Dumbartonshire and Argyle. A thin mist, partaking more of the lacy character of a haze than the texture of a vapour, spreading from the river, softened the nearer features of the view, while the distant were glowing in the golden blaze of the western skies, and the outlines of the city on the left appeared gilded with a brighter light, every window sparkling as if illuminated from within. The colour of the trees and hedges was beginning to change, and here and there a tuft of yellow leaves, and occasionally the berries of the mountain ash, like clusters of fiery embers, with sheaves of corn, and reapers in a few of the neighbouring fields, showed that the summer was entirely past, and the harvest time begun.
The calm diffused over the face of the landscape—the numerous images of maturity and repose everywhere around—were calculated to soothe the spirit, to inspire gentle thoughts, and to awaken pleasing recollections; and there was something in the feelings with which the lovers had separated, if not altogether in unison with the graciousness of the hour, still so much in harmony with the general benignity of nature, that Charles felt his resolution and self-denial elevated with a sentiment of devotion, mingled with the fond enthusiasm of his passion. ‘It is but a short time—a few months—and we shall be happy,’ he exclaimed to himself; ‘and our happiness will be the dearer that we shall have earned it by this sacrifice to prudence and to duty.’
But Charles and Isabella had estimated their fortitude too highly. They were both inexperienced in what the world really is; and her tender and sensitive spirit was soon found incapable of withstanding the trials and the humiliation to which she found herself subjected.
It was part of her business to carry home the dresses made up for Miss Mally’s customers; and although the Glasgow ladies of that time were perhaps not more difficult to please with the style or fashion of their gowns and millinery than those of our own day, yet some of them were less actuated by a compassionate consideration for the altered fortunes of Isabella than all our fair contemporaries would undoubtedly have been. The unfortunate girl was, in consequence, often obliged to suffer taunts and animadversions, which, though levelled against the taste or inattention of her mistress, entered not the less painfully into her young and delicate bosom. Still, however, she struggled against the harsh circumstances to which she was exposed; but her sensibilities were stronger than her courage, and her beauty betrayed what she felt, and soon began to fade.
Charles was in the practice of accompanying her in the evenings when she commonly performed her disagreeable errands, and relieved her of the burden of her band-box, joyfully counting how much of the probationary year was already past, and cheering her with the assurance that her misfortunes had only endeared her to him the more. It happened, however, that, one Saturday, being late of reaching the place of rendezvous—the foot of the staircase which led to Miss Mally’s dwelling—Isabella had gone away before he arrived, with a new dress to Mrs. Jarvie, the wife of the far-famed Bailie Nicol, the same Matty who lighted the worthy magistrate to the Tolbooth, on that memorable night when he, the son of the deacon, found his kinsman