The grandfather, still seated in his ample chair by the care of Ines (for his son had grown very indifferent about him), watched her moving fingers, and exclaimed, with the petulance of dotage, “Aye—you are arraying them in embroidery, while I am in rags.—In rags!” he repeated, holding out the slender garments which the beggared family could with difficulty spare him. Ines tried to pacify him, and showed her work, to prove that it was the remnants of her children’s former dress she was repairing; but, with horror unutterable, she perceived her husband incensed at these expressions of dotage, and venting his frantic and fearful indignation in language that she tried to bury the sound of, by pressing closer to the old man, and attempting to fix his bewildered attention on herself and her work. This was easily accomplished, and all was well, till they were about to separate on their wretched precarious errands.
Then a new and untold feeling trembled at the heart of one of the young wanderers. Julia remembered the occurrence of a preceding evening—she thought of the tempting gold, the flattering language, and the tender tone of the young cavalier. She saw her family perishing around her for want—she felt it consuming her own vitals—and as she cast her eye round the squalid room, the gold glittered brighter and brighter in her eye. A faint hope, aided perhaps by a still more faint suggestion of venial pride, swelled in her heart. “Perhaps he might love me,” she whispered to herself, “and think me not unworthy of his hand.” Then despair returned to the charge. “I must die of famine,” she thought, “if I return unaided—and why may I not by my death benefit my family! I will never survive shame, but they may—for they will not know it!”—She went out, and took a direction different from that of the family.
Night came on—the wanderers returned slowly one by one—Julia was the last. Her brothers and sister had each obtained a trifling alms, for they had learned Spanish enough to beg in—and the old man’s face wore a vacant smile, as he saw the store produced, which was, after all, scarce sufficient to afford a meal for the youngest.
“And have you brought us nothing, Julia?” said her parents. She stood apart, and in silence. Her father repeated the question in a raised and angry voice.
She started at the sound, and, rushing forward, buried her head in her mother’s bosom. “Nothing—nothing,” she cried, in a broken and suffocated voice; “I tried—my weak and wicked heart submitted to the thought for a moment—but no—no, not even to save you from perishing, could I!—I came home to perish first myself!” Her shuddering parents comprehended her—and amid their agony they blessed her and wept—but not from grief. The meal was divided, of which Julia at first steadily refused to partake, as she had not contributed to it, till her reluctance was overcome by the affectionate importunity of the rest, and she complied.
It was during this division of what all believed to be their last meal, that Walberg gave one of those proofs of sudden and fearful violence of temper, bordering on insanity, which he had betrayed latterly. He seemed to notice, with sullen displeasure, that his wife had (as she always did) reserved the largest portion for his father. He eyed it askance at first, muttering angrily to himself. Then he spoke more aloud, though not so as to be heard by the deaf old man, who was sluggishly devouring his sordid meal. Then the sufferings of his children seemed to inspire him with a kind of wild resentment, and he started up, exclaiming, “My son sells his blood to a surgeon, to save us from perishing!52 My daughter trembles on the verge of prostitution, to procure us a meal!” Then fiercely addressing his father, “And what dost thou do, old dotard? Rise up—rise up, and beg for us thyself, or thou must starve!”—and, as he spoke, he raised his arm against the helpless old man. At this horrid sight, Ines shrieked aloud, and the children, rushing forward, interposed. The wretched father, incensed to madness, dealt blows among them, which were borne without a murmur; and then, the storm being exhausted, he sat down and wept.
At this moment, to the astonishment and terror of all except Walberg, the old man, who, since the night of his wife’s interment, had never moved but from his chair to his bed, and that not without assistance, rose suddenly from his seat, and, apparently in obedience to his son, walked with a firm and steady pace towards the door. When he had reached it, he paused, looked back on them with a fruitless effort at recollection, and went out slowly;—and such was the
