A Romance of the Republic | Page 8

by her father's fond indulgence
during two years' residence in Paris. He was wealthy at that time; but
he afterward became entangled in pecuniary difficulties, and his health
declined. He took a liking to me, and proposed that I should purchase
Eulalia, and thus enable him to cancel a debt due to a troublesome
creditor whom he suspected of having an eye upon his daughter. I gave
him a large sum for her, and brought her with me to New Orleans. Do
not despise me for it, my young friend. If it had been told to me a few
years before, in my New England home, that I could ever become a
party in such a transaction, I should have rejected the idea with
indignation. But my disappointed and lonely condition rendered me an
easy prey to temptation, and I was where public opinion sanctioned
such connections. Besides, there were kindly motives mixed up with
selfish ones. I pitied the unfortunate father, and I feared his handsome
daughter might fall into hands that would not protect her so carefully as
I resolved to do. I knew the freedom of her choice was not interfered
with, for she confessed she loved me.
"Señor Gonsalez, who was more attached to her than to anything else in
the world, soon afterward gathered up the fragments of his broken
fortune, and came to reside near us. I know it was a great satisfaction to
his dying hours that he left Eulalia in my care, and the dear girl was
entirely happy with me. If I had manumitted her, carried her abroad,
and legally married her, I should have no remorse mingled with my
sorrow for her loss. Loving her faithfully, as I did to the latest moment
of her life, I now find it difficult to explain to myself how I came to
neglect such an obvious duty. I was always thinking that I would do it
at some future time. But marriage with a quadroon would have been
void, according to the laws of Louisiana; and, being immersed in
business, I never seemed to find time to take her abroad. When one has
taken the first wrong step, it becomes dangerously easy to go on in the

same path. A man's standing here is not injured by such irregular
connections; and my faithful, loving Eulalia meekly accepted her
situation as a portion of her inherited destiny. Mine was the fault, not
hers; for I was free to do as I pleased, and she never had been. I acted in
opposition to moral principles, which the education of false
circumstances had given her no opportunity to form. I had remorseful
thoughts at times, but I am quite sure she was never troubled in that
way. She loved and trusted me entirely. She knew that the marriage of a
white man with one of her race was illegal; and she quietly accepted the
fact, as human beings do accept what they are powerless to overcome.
Her daughters attributed her olive complexion to a Spanish origin; and
their only idea was, and is, that she was my honored wife, as indeed she
was in the inmost recesses of my heart. I gradually withdrew from the
few acquaintances I had formed in New Orleans; partly because I was
satisfied with the company of Eulalia and our children, and partly
because I could not take her with me into society. She had no
acquaintances here, and we acquired the habit of living in a little world
by ourselves,--a world which, as you have seen, was transformed into a
sort of fairy-land by her love of beautiful things. After I lost her, it was
my intention to send the children immediately to France to be educated.
But procrastination is my besetting sin; and the idea of parting with
them was so painful, that I have deferred and deferred it. The suffering
I experience on their account is a just punishment for the wrong I did
their mother. When I think how beautiful, how talented, how
affectionate, and how pure they are, and in what a cruel position I have
placed them, I have terrible writhings of the heart. I do not think I am
destined to long life; and who will protect them when I am gone?"
A consciousness of last night's wishes and dreams made Alfred blush
as he said, "It occurred to me that your eldest daughter might be
betrothed to Mr. Fitzgerald."
"I hope not," quickly rejoined Mr. Royal. "He is not the sort of man
with whom I would like to intrust her happiness. I think, if it were so,
Rosabella would have told me, for my children always confide in me."
"I took it for granted that you liked him," replied Alfred; "for you said

an