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Washington Irving's short story: The Pride of the Village
May no wolfe howle; no screech owle stir
A wing about thy sepulchre!
No boysterous winds or stormes come hither,
To starve or wither
Thy soft sweet earth! but, like a spring,
Love kept it ever flourishing.
HERRICK.
IN the course of an excursion through one of the remote counties
of England, I had struck into one of those cross-roads that lead
through the more secluded parts of the country, and stopped one
afternoon at a village the situation of which was beautifully
rural and retired. There was an air of primitive simplicity about
its inhabitants not to be found in the villages which lie on the
great coach-roads. I determined to pass the night there, and,
having taken an early dinner, strolled out to enjoy the
neighboring scenery.
My ramble, as is usually the case with travellers, soon led me to
the church, which stood at a little distance from the village.
Indeed, it was an object of some curiosity, its old tower being
completely overrun with ivy so that only here and there a jutting
buttress, an angle of gray wall, or a fantastically carved
ornament peered through the verdant covering. It was a lovely
evening. The early part of the day had been dark and showery, but
in the afternoon it had cleared up, and, though sullen clouds
still hung overhead, yet there was a broad tract of golden sky in
the west, from which the setting sun gleamed through the dripping
leaves and lit up all Nature into a melancholy smile. It seemed
like the parting hour of a good Christian smiling on the sins and
sorrows of the world, and giving, in the serenity of his decline,
an assurance that he will rise again in glory.
I had seated myself on a half-sunken tombstone, and was musing,
as one is apt to do at this sober-thoughted hour, on past scenes
and early friends--on those who were distant and those who were
dead--and indulging in that kind of melancholy fancying which has
in it something sweeter even than pleasure. Every now and then
the stroke of a bell from the neighboring tower fell on my ear;
its tones were in unison with the scene, and, instead of jarring,
chimed in with my feelings; and it was some time before I
recollected that it must be tolling the knell of some new tenant
of the tomb.
Presently I saw a funeral train moving across the village green;
it wound slowly along a lane, was lost, and reappeared through
the breaks of the hedges, until it passed the place where I was
sitting. The pall was supported by young girls dressed in white,
and another, about the age of seventeen, walked before, bearing a
chaplet of white flowers--a token that the deceased was a young
and unmarried female. The corpse was followed by the parents.
They were a venerable couple of the better order of peasantry.
The father seemed to repress his feelings, but his fixed eye,
contracted brow, and deeply-furrowed face showed the struggle
that was passing within. His wife hung on his arm, and wept aloud
with the convulsive bursts of a mother's sorrow.
I followed the funeral into the church. The bier was placed in
the centre aisle, and the chaplet of white flowers, with a pair
of white gloves, was hung over the seat which the deceased had
occupied.
Every one knows the soul-subduing pathos of the funeral service,
for who is so fortunate as never to have followed some one he has
loved to the tomb? But when performed over the remains of
innocence and beauty, thus laid low in the bloom of existence,
what can be more affecting? At that simple but most solemn
consignment of the body to the grave-"Earth to earth, ashes to
ashes, dust to dust!"--the tears of the youthful companions of
the deceased flowed unrestrained. The father still seemed to
struggle with his feelings, and to comfort himself with the
assurance that the dead are blessed which die in the Lord; but
the mother only thought of her child as a flower of the field cut
down and withered in the midst of its sweetness; she was like
Rachel, "mourning over her children, and would not be comforted."
On returning to the inn I learnt the whole story of the deceased.
It was a simple one, and such as has often been told. She had
been the beauty and pride of the village. Her father had once
been an opulent farmer, but was reduced in circumstances. This
was an only child, and brought up entirely at home in the
simplicity of rural life. She had been the pupil of the village
pastor, the favorite lamb of his little flock. The good man
watched over her education with paternal care; it was limited and
suitable to the sphere in which she was to move, for he only
sought to make her an ornament to her station in life, not to
raise her above it. The tenderness and indulgence of her parents
and the exemption from all ordinary occupations had fostered a
natural grace and delicacy of character that accorded with the
fragile loveliness of her form. She appeared like some tender
plant of the garden blooming accidentally amid the hardier
natives of the fields.
The superiority of her charms was felt and acknowledged by her
companions, but without envy, for it was surpassed by the
unassuming gentleness and winning kindness of her manners. It
might be truly said of her:
"This is the prettiest low-born lass, that ever
Ran on the green-sward: nothing she does or seems
But smacks of something greater than herself;
Too noble for this place."
The village was one of those sequestered spots which still retain
some vestiges of old English customs. It had its rural festivals
and holiday pastimes, and still kept up some faint observance of
the once popular rites of May. These, indeed, had been promoted
by its present pastor, who was a lover of old customs and one of
those simple Christians that think their mission fulfilled by
promoting joy on earth and good-will among mankind. Under his
auspices the May-pole stood from year to year in the centre of
the village green; on Mayday it was decorated with garlands and
streamers, and a queen or lady of the May was appointed, as in
former times, to preside at the sports and distribute the prizes
and rewards. The picturesque situation of the village and the
fancifulness of its rustic fetes would often attract the notice
of casual visitors. Among these, on one May-day, was a young
officer whose regiment had been recently quartered in the
neighborhood. He was charmed with the native taste that pervaded
this village pageant, but, above all, with the dawning loveliness
of the queen of May. It was the village favorite who was crowned
with flowers, and blushing and smiling in all the beautiful
confusion of girlish diffidence and delight. The artlessness of
rural habits enabled him readily to make her acquaintance; be
gradually won his way into her intimacy, and paid his court to
her in that unthinking way in which young officers are too apt to
trifle with rustic simplicity.
There was nothing in his advances to startle or alarm. He never
even talked of love, but there are modes of making it more
eloquent than language, and which convey it subtilely and
irresistibly to the heart. The beam of the eye, the tone of
voice, the thousand tendernesses which emanate from every word
and look and action,--these form the true eloquence of love, and
can always be felt and understood, but never described. Can we
wonder that they should readily win a heart young, guileless, and
susceptible? As to her, she loved almost unconsciously; she
scarcely inquired what was the growing passion that was absorbing
every thought and feeling, or what were to be its consequences.
She, indeed, looked not to the future. When present, his looks
and words occupied her whole attention; when absent, she thought
but of what had passed at their recent interview. She would
wander with him through the green lanes and rural scenes of the
vicinity. He taught her to see new beauties in Nature; he talked
in the language of polite and cultivated life, and breathed into
her ear the witcheries of romance and poetry.
Perhaps there could not have been a passion between the sexes
more pure than this innocent girl's. The gallant figure of her
youthful admirer and the splendor of his military attire might at
first have charmed her eye, but it was not these that had
captivated her heart. Her attachment had something in it of
idolatry. She looked up to him as to a being of a superior order.
She felt in his society the enthusiasm of a mind naturally
delicate and poetical, and now first awakened to a keen
perception of the beautiful and grand. Of the sordid distinctions
of rank and fortune she thought nothing; it was the difference of
intellect, of demeanor, of manners, from those of the rustic
society to which she had been accustomed, that elevated him in
her opinion. She would listen to him with charmed ear and
downcast look of mute delight, and her cheek would mantle with
enthusiasm; or if ever she ventured a shy glance of timid
admiration, it was as quickly withdrawn, and she would sigh and
blush at the idea of her comparative unworthiness.
Her lover was equally impassioned, but his passion was mingled
with feelings of a coarser nature. He had begun the connection in
levity, for he had often heard his brother-officers boast of
their village conquests, and thought some triumph of the kind
necessary to his reputation as a man of spirit. But he was too
full of youthful fervor. His heart had not yet been rendered
sufficiently cold and selfish by a wandering and a dissipated
life: it caught fire from the very flame it sought to kindle, and
before he was aware of the nature of his situation he became
really in love.
What was he to do? There were the old obstacles which so
incessantly occur in these heedless attachments. His rank in
life, the prejudices of titled connections, his dependence upon a
proud and unyielding father, all forbade him to think of
matrimony; but when he looked down upon this innocent being, so
tender and confiding, there was a purity in her manners, a
blamelessness in her life, and a beseeching modesty in her looks
that awed down every licentious feeling. In vain did he try to
fortify himself by a thousand heartless examples of men of
fashion, and to chill the glow of generous sentiment with that
cold derisive levity with which he had heard them talk of female
virtue: whenever he came into her presence she was still
surrounded by that mysterious but impassive charm of virgin
purity in whose hallowed sphere no guilty thought can live.
The sudden arrival of orders for the regiment to repair to the
Continent completed the confusion of his mind. He remained for a
short time in a state of the most painful irresolution; he
hesitated to communicate the tidings until the day for marching
was at hand, when he gave her the intelligence in the course of
an evening ramble.
The idea of parting had never before occurred to her. It broke in
at once upon her dream of felicity; she looked upon it as a
sudden and insurmountable evil, and wept with the guileless
simplicity of a child. He drew her to his bosom and kissed the
tears from her soft cheek; nor did he meet with a repulse, for
there are moments of mingled sorrow and tenderness which hallow
the caresses of affection. He was naturally impetuous, and the
sight of beauty apparently yielding in his arms, the confidence
of his power over her, and the dread of losing her forever all
conspired to overwhelm his better feelings: he ventured to
propose that she should leave her home and be the companion of
his fortunes.
He was quite a novice in seduction, and blushed and faltered at
his own baseness; but so innocent of mind was his intended victim
that she was at first at a loss to comprehend his meaning, and
why she should leave her native village and the humble roof of
her parents. When at last the nature of his proposal flashed upon
her pure mind, the effect was withering. She did not weep; she
did not break forth into reproach; she said not a word, but she
shrunk back aghast as from a viper, gave him a look of anguish
that pierced to his very soul, and, clasping her hands in agony,
fled, as if for refuge, to her father's cottage.
The officer retired confounded, humiliated, and repentant. It is
uncertain what might have been the result of the conflict of his
feelings, had not his thoughts been diverted by the bustle of
departure. New scenes, new pleasures, and new companions soon
dissipated his self-reproach and stifled his tenderness; yet,
amidst the stir of camps, the revelries of garrisons, the array
of armies, and even the din of battles, his thoughts would
sometimes steal back to the scenes of rural quiet and village
simplicity--the white cottage, the footpath along the silver
brook and up the hawthorn hedge, and the little village maid
loitering along it, leaning on his arm and listening to him with
eyes beaming with unconscious affection.
The shock which the poor girl had received in the destruction of
all her ideal world had indeed been cruel. Faintings and
hysterics had at first shaken her tender frame, and were
succeeded by a settled and pining melancholy. She had beheld from
her window the march of the departing troops. She had seen her
faithless lover borne off, as if in triumph, amidst the sound of
drum and trumpet and the pomp of arms. She strained a last aching
gaze after him as the morning sun glittered about his figure and
his plume waved in the breeze; he passed away like a bright
vision from her sight, and left her all in darkness.
It would be trite to dwell on the particulars of her after story.
It was, like other tales of love, melancholy. She avoided society
and wandered out alone in the walks she had most frequented with
her lover. She sought, like the stricken deer, to weep in silence
and loneliness and brood over the barbed sorrow that rankled in
her soul. Sometimes she would be seen late of an evening sitting
in the porch of the village church, and the milk-maids, returning
from the fields, would now and then overhear her singing some
plaintive ditty in the hawthorn walk. She became fervent in her
devotions at church, and as the old people saw her approach, so
wasted away, yet with a hectic gloom and that hallowed air which
melancholy diffuses round the form, they would make way for her
as for something spiritual, and looking after her, would shake
their heads in gloomy foreboding.
She felt a conviction that she was hastening to the tomb, but
looked forward to it as a place of rest. The silver cord that had
bound her to existence was loosed, and there seemed to be no more
pleasure under the sun. If ever her gentle bosom had entertained
resentment against her lover, it was extinguished. She was
incapable of angry passions, and in a moment of saddened
tenderness she penned him a farewell letter. It was couched in
the simplest language, but touching from its very simplicity. She
told him that she was dying, and did not conceal from him that
his conduct was the cause. She even depicted the sufferings which
she had experienced, but concluded with saying that she could not
die in peace until she had sent him her forgiveness and her
blessing.
By degrees her strength declined that she could no longer leave
the cottage. She could only totter to the window, where, propped
up in her chair, it was her enjoyment to sit all day and look out
upon the landscape. Still she uttered no complaint nor imparted
to any one the malady that was preying on her heart. She never
even mentioned her lover's name, but would lay her head on her
mother's bosom and weep in silence. Her poor parents hung in mute
anxiety over this fading blossom of their hopes, still flattering
themselves that it might again revive to freshness and that the
bright unearthly bloom which sometimes flushed her cheek might be
the promise of returning health.
In this way she was seated between them one Sunday afternoon; her
hands were clasped in theirs, the lattice was thrown open, and
the soft air that stole in brought with it the fragrance of the
clustering honeysuckle which her own hands had trained round the
window.
Her father had just been reading a chapter in the Bible: it spoke
of the vanity of worldly things and of the joys of heaven: it
seemed to have diffused comfort and serenity through her bosom.
Her eye was fixed on the distant village church: the bell had
tolled for the evening service; the last villager was lagging
into the porch, and everything had sunk into that hallowed
stillness peculiar to the day of rest. Her parents were gazing on
her with yearning hearts. Sickness and sorrow, which pass so
roughly over some faces, had given to hers the expression of a
seraph's. A tear trembled in her soft blue eye. Was she thinking
of her faithless lover? or were her thoughts wandering to that
distant churchyard, into whose bosom she might soon be gathered?
Suddenly the clang of hoofs was heard: a horseman galloped to the
cottage; he dismounted before the window; the poor girl gave a
faint exclamation and sunk back in her chair: it was her
repentant lover. He rushed into the house and flew to clasp her
to his bosom; but her wasted form, her deathlike countenance--so
wan, yet so lovely in its desolation--smote him to the soul, and
he threw himself in agony at her feet. She was too faint to
rise--she attempted to extend her trembling hand--her lips moved
as if she spoke, but no word was articulated; she looked down
upon him with a smile of unutterable tenderness, and closed her
eyes forever.
Such are the particulars which I gathered of this village story.
They are but scanty, and I am conscious have little novelty to
recommend them. In the present rage also for strange incident and
high-seasoned narrative they may appear trite and insignificant,
but they interested me strongly at the time; and, taken in
connection with the affecting ceremony which I had just
witnessed, left a deeper impression on my mind than many
circumstances of a more striking nature. I have passed through
the place since, and visited the church again from a better
motive than mere curiosity. It was a wintry evening: the trees
were stripped of their foliage, the churchyard looked naked and
mournful, and the wind rustled coldly through the dry grass.
Evergreens, however, had been planted about the grave of the
village favorite, and osiers were bent over it to keep the turf
uninjured.
The church-door was open and I stepped in. There hung the chaplet
of flowers and the gloves, as on the day of the funeral: the
flowers were withered, it is true, but care seemed to have been
taken that no dust should soil their whiteness. I have seen many
monuments where art has exhausted its powers to awaken the
sympathy of the spectator, but I have met with none that spoke
more touchingly to my heart than this simple but delicate memento
of departed innocence.
Washington Irving's short story: The Pride of the Village
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