The Daughters of Danaus | Page 6

of sweep----" to the flushing stretches of pasture and the windy hill-side.
In spite of the view that Hadria had expounded in her capacity of lecturer, she had an inner sense that somehow, after all, the will can perform astonishing feats in Fate's despite. Her intellect, rather than her heart, had opposed the philosophy of Emerson. Her sentiment recoiled from admitting the possibility of such tragedy as her expressed belief implied. This morning, the wonder and the grandeur of the dawn supplied arguments to faith. If the best in human nature were always to be hunted down and extinguished, if the efforts to rise in the scale of being, to bring gifts instead of merely absorbing benefits, were only by a rare combination of chances to escape the doom of annihilation, where was one to turn to for hope, or for a motive for effort? How could one reconcile the marvellous beauty of the universe, the miracles of colour, form, and, above all, of music, with such a chaotic moral condition, and such unlovely laws in favour of dulness, cowardice, callousness, cruelty? One aspired to be an upholder and not a destroyer, but if it were a useless pain and a bootless venture----?
Hadria tried to find some proof of the happier philosophy that would satisfy her intellect, but it refused to be comforted. Yet as she wandered in the rosy light over the awakening fields, her heart sang within her. The world was exquisite, life was a rapture!
She could take existence in her hands and form and fashion it at her will, obviously, easily; her strength yearned for the task.
Yet all the time, the importunate intellect kept insisting that feeling was deceptive, that health and youth and the freshness of the morning spoke in her, and not reason or experience. Feeling was left untouched nevertheless. It was impossible to stifle the voices that prophesied golden things. Life was all before her; she was full of vigour and longing and good will; the world stretched forth as a fair territory, with magical pathways leading up to dizzy mountain tops. With visions such as these, the members of the Preposterous Society had fired their imaginations, and gained impetus for their various efforts and their various ambitions.
Hadria had been among the most hopeful of the party, and had pointed to the loftier visions, and the more impersonal aims. Circumstance must give way, compromise was wrong; we had but a short time in this world, and mere details and prejudices must not be allowed to interfere with one's right to live to the utmost of one's scope. But it was easier to state a law than to obey it; easier to inspire others with faith than to hold fast to it oneself.
The time for taking matters in one's own hands had scarcely come. A girl was so helpless, so tied by custom. One could engage, so far, only in guerilla warfare with the enemy, who lurked everywhere in ambush, ready to harass the wayfarers with incessant petty attack. But life must have something more to offer than this--life with its myriad interests, dramas, mysteries, arts, poetries, delights!
By the river, where it had worn for itself a narrow ravine, with steep rocky sides or "clints," as they were called, several short tunnels or passages had been cut in places where the rock projected as far as the bank of the river, which was followed in its windings by a narrow footway, leading to the farmstead of Craw Gill.
In one part, a series of such tunnels, with intervals of open pathway, occurred in picturesque fashion, causing a singular effect of light and shade.
As Hadria stood admiring the glow of the now fully-risen sun, upon the wall of rock that rose beyond the opening of the tunnel which she had just passed through, she heard footsteps advancing along the riverside path, and guessed that Algitha and Ernest had come to fetch her, or to join in any absurd project that she might have in view. Although Algitha was two-and-twenty, and Hadria only a year younger, they were still guilty at times of wild escapades, with the connivance of their brothers. Walks or rides at sunrise were ordinary occurrences in the family, and in summer, bathing in the river was a favourite amusement.
"I thought I recognised your footsteps," said Hadria, as the two figures appeared at the mouth of the tunnel, the low rays of the sun lighting them up, for a moment, as they turned the sharp bend of the narrow path, before entering the shadow.
A quantity of brown dead leaves were strewn upon the floor of the rock-passage, blown in by the wind from the pathway at each end, or perhaps through the opening in the middle of the tunnel that looked out upon the rushing river.
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