Maria; Or, The Wrongs of Woman
added—“Yet I will take some refreshment: I mean not to die.—No; I will
preserve my senses; and convince even you, sooner than you are aware
of, that my intellects have never been disturbed, though the exertion
of them may have been suspended by some infernal drug.”
Doubt gathered still thicker on the brow of her guard, as she attempted
to convict her of mistake.
“Have patience!” exclaimed Maria, with a solemnity that inspired awe.
“My God! how have I been schooled into the practice!” A suffocation of
voice betrayed the agonizing emotions she was labouring to keep down;
and conquering a qualm of disgust, she calmly endeavoured to eat enough
to prove her docility, perpetually turning to the suspicious female,
whose observation she courted, while she was making the bed and
adjusting the room.
“Come to me often,” said Maria, with a tone of persuasion, in
consequence of a vague plan that she had hastily adopted, when, after
surveying this woman’s form and features, she felt convinced that she
had an understanding above the common standard, “and believe me mad,
till you are obliged to acknowledge the contrary.” The woman was no
fool, that is, she was superior to her class; nor had misery quite
petrified the life’s-blood of humanity, to which reflections on our own
misfortunes only give a more orderly course. The manner, rather than
the expostulations, of Maria made a slight suspicion dart into her mind
with corresponding sympathy, which various other avocations, and the
habit of banishing compunction, prevented her, for the present, from
examining more minutely.
But when she was told that no person, excepting the physician appointed
by her family, was to be permitted to see the lady at the end of the
gallery, she opened her keen eyes still wider, and uttered a—“hem!”
before she enquired—“Why?” She was briefly told, in reply, that the
malady was hereditary, and the fits not occurring but at very long and
irregular intervals, she must be carefully watched; for the length of
these lucid periods only rendered her more mischievous, when any
vexation or caprice brought on the paroxysm of phrensy.
Had her master trusted her, it is probable that neither pity nor
curiosity would have made her swerve from the straight line of her
interest; for she had suffered too much in her intercourse with
mankind, not to determine to look for support, rather to humouring
their passions, than courting their approbation by the integrity of her
conduct. A deadly blight had met her at the very threshold of
existence; and the wretchedness of her mother seemed a heavy weight
fastened on her innocent neck, to drag her down to perdition. She could
not heroically determine to succour an unfortunate; but, offended at
the bare supposition that she could be deceived with the same ease as a
common servant, she no longer curbed her curiosity; and, though she
never seriously fathomed her own intentions, she would sit, every
moment she could steal from observation, listening to the tale, which
Maria was eager to relate with all the persuasive eloquence of grief.
It is so cheering to see a human face, even if little of the divinity
of virtue beam in it, that Maria anxiously expected the return of the
attendant, as of a gleam of light to break the gloom of idleness.
Indulged sorrow, she perceived, must blunt or sharpen the faculties to
the two opposite extremes; producing stupidity, the moping melancholy
of indolence; or the restless activity of a disturbed imagination. She
sunk into one state, after being fatigued by the other: till the want
of occupation became even more painful than the actual pressure or
apprehension of sorrow; and the confinement that froze her into a nook
of existence, with an unvaried prospect before her, the most
insupportable of evils. The lamp of life seemed to be spending itself
to chase the vapours of a dungeon which no art could dissipate.—And to
what purpose did she rally all her energy?—Was not the world a vast
prison, and women born slaves?
Though she failed immediately to rouse a lively sense of injustice in
the mind of her guard, because it had been sophisticated into
misanthropy, she touched her heart. Jemima (she had only a claim to a
Christian name, which had not procured her any Christian privileges)
could patiently hear of Maria’s confinement on false pretences; she had
felt the crushing hand of power, hardened by the exercise of injustice,
and ceased to wonder at the perversions of the understanding, which
systematize oppression; but, when told that her child, only four months
old, had been torn from her, even while she was discharging the
tenderest maternal office, the woman awoke in a bosom long estranged
from feminine emotions, and Jemima determined to alleviate all in her
power, without hazarding the loss of her place, the sufferings of a
wretched mother, apparently injured, and certainly unhappy. A sense of
right seems to result from the simplest act of reason, and to preside
over the faculties of the mind, like the master-sense of feeling, to
rectify the rest; but (for the comparison may be carried still farther)
how often is the exquisite sensibility of both weakened or destroyed by
the vulgar occupations, and ignoble pleasures of life?
The preserving her situation was, indeed, an important object to
Jemima, who had been hunted from hole to hole, as if she had been a
beast of prey, or infected with a moral plague. The wages she received,
the greater part of which she hoarded, as her only chance for
independence, were much more considerable than she could reckon on
obtaining any where else, were it possible that she, an outcast from
society, could be permitted to earn a subsistence in a reputable
family. Hearing Maria perpetually complain of listlessness, and the not
being able to beguile grief by resuming her customary pursuits, she was
easily prevailed on, by compassion, and that involuntary respect for
abilities, which those who possess them can never eradicate, to bring
her some books and implements for writing. Maria’s conversation had
amused and interested her, and the natural consequence was a desire,
scarcely observed by herself, of obtaining the esteem of a person she
admired. The remembrance of better days was rendered more lively; and
the sentiments then acquired appearing less romantic than they had for
a long period, a spark of hope roused her mind to new activity.
How grateful was her attention to Maria! Oppressed by a dead weight of
existence, or preyed on by the gnawing worm of discontent, with what
eagerness did she endeavour to shorten the long days, which left no
traces behind! She seemed to be sailing on the vast ocean of life,
without seeing any land-mark to indicate the progress of time; to find
employment was then to find variety, the animating principle of nature.
CHAPTER 2
Earnestly as Maria endeavoured to soothe, by reading, the anguish of
her wounded mind, her thoughts would often wander from the subject she
was led to discuss, and tears of maternal tenderness obscured the
reasoning page. She descanted on “the ills which flesh is heir to,”
with bitterness, when the recollection of her babe was revived by a
tale of fictitious woe, that bore any resemblance to her own; and her
imagination was continually employed, to conjure up and embody the
various phantoms of misery, which folly and vice had let loose on the
world. The loss of her babe was the tender string; against other cruel
remembrances she laboured to steel her bosom; and even a ray of hope,
in the midst of her gloomy reveries, would sometimes gleam on the dark
horizon of futurity, while persuading herself that she ought to cease
to hope, since happiness was no where to be found.—But of her child,
debilitated by the grief with which its mother had been assailed before
it saw the light, she could not think without an impatient struggle.
“I, alone, by my active tenderness, could have saved,” she would
exclaim, “from an early blight, this sweet blossom; and, cherishing it,
I should have had something still to love.”
In proportion as other expectations were torn from her, this tender one
had been fondly clung to, and knit into her heart.
The books she had obtained, were soon devoured, by one who had no other
resource to escape from sorrow, and the feverish dreams of ideal
wretchedness or felicity, which equally weaken the intoxicated
sensibility. Writing was then the only alternative, and she wrote some
rhapsodies descriptive of the state of her mind; but the events of her
past life pressing on her, she resolved circumstantially to relate
them, with the sentiments that experience, and more matured reason,
would naturally suggest. They might perhaps instruct her daughter, and
shield her from the misery, the tyranny, her mother knew not how to
avoid.
This thought gave life to her diction, her soul flowed into it, and she
soon found the task of recollecting almost obliterated impressions very
interesting. She lived again in the revived emotions of youth, and
forgot her present in the retrospect of sorrows that had assumed an
unalterable character.
Though this employment lightened the weight of time, yet, never losing
sight of her main object, Maria did not allow any opportunity to slip
of winning on the affections of Jemima; for she discovered in her a
strength of mind, that excited her esteem, clouded as it was by the
misanthropy of despair.
An insulated being, from the misfortune of her birth, she despised and
preyed on the society by which she had been oppressed, and loved not
her fellow-creatures, because she had never been beloved. No mother had
ever fondled her, no father or brother had protected her from outrage;
and the man who had plunged her into infamy, and deserted her when she
stood in greatest need of support, deigned not to smooth with kindness
the road to ruin. Thus degraded, was she let loose on the world; and
virtue, never nurtured by affection, assumed the stern aspect of
selfish independence.
This general view of her life, Maria gathered from her exclamations and
dry remarks. Jemima indeed displayed a strange mixture of interest and
suspicion; for she would listen to her with earnestness, and then
suddenly interrupt the conversation, as if afraid of resigning, by
giving way to her sympathy, her dear-bought knowledge of the world.
Maria alluded to the possibility of an escape, and mentioned a
compensation, or reward; but the style in which she was repulsed made
her cautious, and determine not to renew the subject, till she knew
more of the character she had to work on. Jemima’s countenance, and
dark hints, seemed to say, “You are an extraordinary woman; but let me
consider, this may only be one of your lucid intervals.” Nay, the very
energy of Maria’s character, made her suspect that the extraordinary
animation she perceived might be the effect of madness. “Should her
husband then substantiate his charge, and get possession of her estate,
from whence would come the promised annuity, or more desired
protection? Besides, might not a woman, anxious to escape, conceal some
of the circumstances which made against her? Was truth to be expected
from one who had been entrapped, kidnapped, in the most fraudulent
manner?”
In this train Jemima continued to argue, the moment after compassion
and respect seemed to make her swerve; and she still resolved not to be
wrought on to do more than soften the rigour of confinement, till she
could advance on surer ground.
Maria was not permitted to walk in the garden; but sometimes, from her
window, she turned her eyes from the gloomy walls, in which she pined
life away, on the poor wretches who strayed along the walks, and
contemplated the most terrific of ruins—that of a human soul. What is