Page images
PDF
EPUB
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
[ocr errors]
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors][ocr errors]
[blocks in formation]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors]
[ocr errors][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]
[merged small][ocr errors][ocr errors][merged small]

60187

LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-No. 255.-7 APRIL, 1849.

From the Dublin University Magazine.

"There was a poor, frail, southern flower, and THE CROSS ON THE SNOW MOUNTAINS.-A under the shadow of its leaves sprang up a seed

sea.

SCANDINAVIAN TALE.

CHAPTER I.

A SHIP, a rude, pine-built vessel, lay tossing, and heaving, and tempest-driven, on a southern Brave, wild-looking Norsemen were on her deck, breasting the storm, and controlling the ship with a desperate strength and almost ferocious energy, which, in those early days, stood in the place of skill. For it was in the time of Europe's stormy, unfettered youth, when civilization was just dawning in those of its climes which were nearest the sun. But the ship came from the north, the wild and savage north; her pine timbers had once rocked to the tempests in a Scandinavian forest, and afterwards, winter by winter, had struggled with the ice-bound waters of Scandinavian seas. It was the ship of a Viking.

The vessel seemed struggling between the sea and sky. The leaden, low clouds almost rested on her topmost masts, as if to press her down into the boiling deep; the storm-spirits howled above her-the waves answered the roar from beneath. And in the ship there was one faint, wailing cry, which made that wild chorus the birth-hymn of a human soul.

The mother, the young mother of an hour, lay unconscious of all the turmoil around her. With the angel of birth came the angel of death; already the shadow of his wings was upon her. The Viking sat at her feet, still, stern, immovable. Perhaps he now felt how it was that the fair southern flower, stolen and forcibly planted on a cold, northern rock, had withered so soon. He sat with his gray head resting on his rough, wrinkled hands, his cold, blue eyes, beneath their shaggy brows, looking with an iron-bound, tearless, terrible grief, upon the death-white face of his young spouse.

ling pine. What mattered it that the flower withered, when the noble pine grew? Was it not glory enough to have sheltered the young seed, and then died? What was the weak southern plant compared to the stately tree-the glory of the north? Let it perish. Why should my lord mourn?"

At this moment a low wail burst from the newborn babe. The sound seemed to pierce like an arrow of light through the mist of death-slumber that was fast shrouding the young mother. Her marble fingers fluttered, her eyes opened, and turned with an imploring gaze towards the nurse, who had taken in her arms the moaning child. "She asks for the babe-give it," muttered the father.

But the hard, rigid features of Ulva showed no pity.

"I guard my lord's child," she said; "his young life must not be perilled by the touch of death."

The mother's eyes wandered towards her husband with a mute, agonized entreaty, that went to his heart.

"Give me the child," his strong voice thundered, unmindful of the terror which convulsed every limb of that frail, perishing form. He laid the babe on her breast, already cold, and guided the feeble, dying hands, until they wrapped it round in a close embrace.

"Now, Clotilde, what wouldst thou ?-speak!" he said, and his voice grew strangely gentle.

Then the strength of a mother's heart conquered even death for a time. Then Jarl's wife looked in her lord's face, and spoke faintly. "Ulva said truly-I die. It was not for me

[blocks in formation]

The nurse laid the babe on a silken cushion at lows that wash against the shores of my own his feet.

"Let my lord look upon his son, his heir. This is a joyful day for the noble Jarl Hialmar. Praise be to Odin; ah, it is a blessed day!"

The Viking's eye turned to the child, and then back again to the mother, and a slight quivering agitated the stern lips.

land, than beneath the northern snows; they have frozen my heart. Not even thou canst warm it, my babe, my little babe!"

The Viking listened without reply. His face was turned away, but his strong, muscular hands were clenched, until the blue veins rose up like knots. At that moment he saw before him, in

"A blessed day, Ulva, sayest thou, and fancy, a young captive maiden, who knelt at his she"

[blocks in formation]

feet, and clasped his robe, praying that he would send her back to her own southern home. Then he beheld a pale woman, the wife of a noble Jarl, with the distinctive chain on her neck, a goldenfettered slave. And both wore the same face, though hardly so white and calm, as the one that drooped over the young babe, with the mournful

lament-"They have frozen my heart; they had been put up to the Virgin and all the saints, have frozen my heart!" that the next might be a son.

And Hialmar felt that he had bestowed the Jarl's coronet and the nuptial ring with a hand little less guilty than if it had been a murderer's.

"Clotilde," whispered he, "thou and I shall never meet more, in life or after. Thou goest to the Christian heaven-I shall drink mead in the Valhalla of my fathers. Before we part, forgive me if I did thee wrong, and say if there is any token by which I may prove that I repent."

The dying mother's eyes wandered from her child to its father, and there was in them less of fear and more of love than he had ever seen.

"Hialmar," she murmured, "I forgive-forgive me, too. Perhaps I might have striven more to love thee; but the dove could not live in the sea-eagle's nest. It is best to die. I have only one prayer-take my babe with thee to my own land; let him stay there in his frail childhood, and betroth him there to some bride who will make his nature gentle, that he may not regard, with the pride and scorn of his northern blood, the mother to whom his birth was death." "I promise," said the Viking, and he lifted his giant sword to swear by.

"Not that; not that!" cried the young mother, as, with desperate energy, she half rose from her bed. "I see blood upon it-my father's my brethren's. O, God! not that."

A superstitious fear seemed to strike like ice through the Jarl's frame. He laid down the sword, and took in his giant palm the tiny hand of the babe.

"This child shall be a token between us," he said, hoarsely. "I swear by thy son and mine to do all thou askest. Clotilde, die in peace."

But the blessing was wafted after an already parted soul.

Ulva started up from the corner where she had crouched, and took the child. As she did so she felt on its neck a little silver cross, which the expiring mother had secretly contrived to place there the only baptism Clotilde could give her babe. Ulva snatched it away, and trampled on it.

"He is all Norse now, true son of the Vikingir. Great Odin; dry up in his young veins every drop of the accursed stranger's blood, and make him wholly the child of Hialmar!"

Another birth-scene. It was among the vinecovered plains of France, where, at the foot of a feudal castle, the limpid Garonne flowed. All was mirth, and sunshine, and song, within and without. Of Charlemagne's knights, there was none braver than Sir Loys of Aveyran. And he was rich, too; his vineyards lay far and wide, outspread to the glowing sun of southern France -so that the minstrels who came to celebrate the approaching birth, had good reason to hail the heir of Sir Loys of Aveyran. An heir it must be, all felt certain, for the knight had already a goodly train of four daughters, and orisons innumerable

It must be a son-for the old nurse of Sir Loyɛ, a strange woman, who, almost dead to this world, was said to peer dimly into the world beyond, had seen a vision, of a young, armed warrior, climbing snow-covered hills, leading by the hand a fair, spirit-like maiden, while the twain between them bore a golden cross, the device of Sir Loys; and the mother-expectant had dreamed of a beautiful boy's face, with clustering amber hair, and beside it appeared another less fair, but more feminine— until at last both faded, and fading, seemed to blend into one. Thereupon the nurse interpreted the two visions as signifying that at the same time would be born, in some distant land, a future bride for the heir.

At last, just after sunset, a light arose in the turret window-a signal to the assembled watchers that one more being was added to earth. The child was born.

Oh, strange and solemn birth-hour, when God breathes into flesh a new spark of his divinity, and makes unto himself another human soul! A soul, it may be, so great, so pure, so glorious, that the whole world acknowledges it to come from God; or, even now confessing, is swayed by it as by a portion of the divine essence. Oh, mysterious instant of a new creation-a creation greater than that of a material world!

The shouts rose up from the valleys, the joyfires blazed on the hills, when the light in the turret was suddenly seen to disappear. It had been dashed down by the hand of Sir Loys, in rage that Heaven had only granted him a daughter. Poor unwelcome little wailer! whose birth brought no glad pride to the father's eye, no smile even to the mother's pale lips. The attendants hardly dared to glance at the helpless innocent, who lay uncaredfor and unregarded. All trembled at the stormy passions of the knight, and stealing away, left the babe alone. Then Ulrika, the old German nurse, came and stood before her foster-son, with his little daughter in her arms.

"Sir Loys," she said, "God has sent thee one more jewel to keep; give unto it the token of joyful acceptance, the father's kiss.”

But Sir Loys turned away in bitter wrath. "It is no treasure; it is a burthen-a curse! Woman, what were all thy dreams worth? Where is the noble boy which thou and the Lady of Aveyran saw? Fools that ye were ! And I, too, believe in such dreaming."

to

There came a wondrous dignity to the German woman's small, spare, age-bent form, and a wild enthusiasm kindled in her still lustrous eyes.

"Shamed be the lips of the Knight of Aveyran, when such words come from them. The dreams which Heaven sends, Heaven will fulfil. Dare not thou to cast contempt on mine age, and on this young bud, fresh from the hands of angels, which Heaven can cause to open into a goodly flower. Doubt not, Sir Loys, the dream will yet come true."

« PreviousContinue »