St. Elmo eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 646 pages of information about St. Elmo.

St. Elmo eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 646 pages of information about St. Elmo.
Oh! if not for my sake, at least for your own, reconsider before the hot irons sear your brow; and hide it here, my love; keep it white and pure and unfurrowed here, in the arms that will never weary of sheltering and clasping you close and safe from the burning brand of fame.  Literati!  A bondage worse than Roman slavery!  Help me to make a proper use of my fortune, and you will do more real good to your race than by all you can ever accomplish with your pen, no matter how successful it may prove.  If you were selfish and heartless as other women, adulation and celebrity and the praise of the public might satisfy you.  But you are not, and I have studied your nature too thoroughly to mistake the result of your ambitious career.  My darling, ambition is the mirage of the literary desert you are anxious to traverse; it is the Bahr Sheitan, the Satan’s water, which will ever recede and mock your thirsty, toil-spent soul.  Dear little pilgrim, do not scorch your feet and wear out your life in the hot, blinding sands, struggling in vain for the constantly fading, vanishing oasis of happy literary celebrity.  Ah! the Sahara of letters is full of bleaching bones that tell where many of your sex as well as of mine fell and perished miserably, even before the noon of life.  Ambitious spirit, come, rest in peace in the cool, quiet, happy, palm-grove that I offer you.  My shrinking violet, sweeter than all Paestum boasts!  You cannot cope successfully with the world of selfish men and frivolous, heartless women, of whom you know absolutely nothing.  To-day I found a passage which you had marked in one of my books, and it echoes ceaselessly in my heart: 

  “‘My future will not copy fair my past.’ 
    I wrote that once; and thinking at my side
    My ministering life-angel justified
    The word by his appealing look upcast
    To the white throne of God, I turned at last,
    And there instead saw thee, not unallied
    To angels in thy soul! * * Then I, long tired
    By natural ills, received the comfort fast;
    While budding at thy sight, my pilgrim’s staff
    Gave out green leaves with morning dews impearled. 
    I seek no copy of life’s first half: 
    Leave here the pages with long musing curled,
    Write me new my future’s epigraph. 
    New angel mine—­unhoped-for in the world!’”

He had passed his arm around her and drawn her close to his side, and the pleading tenderness of his low voice was indeed hard to resist.

“No, Mr. Murray, my decision is unalterable.  If you do really love me, spare me, spare me, further entreaty.  Before we part there are some things I should like to say, and I have little time left.  Will you hear me?”

He did not answer, but tightened his arm, drew her head to his bosom, and leaned his face down on hers.

“Mr. Murray, I want to leave my Bible with you, because there are many passages marked which would greatly comfort and help you.  It is the most precious thing I possess, for Grandpa gave it to me when I was a little girl, and I could not bear to leave it with any one but you.  I have it here in my hand; will you look into it sometimes if I give it to you?”

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Project Gutenberg
St. Elmo from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.