IT is an hour short of midnight, and the depth of winter. The morrow is Christmas Day. Mirk Abbey bears snow everywhere; inches thick upon its huge broad coping-stones; much even on its sloping roof, save on the side where the north wind makes fitful rushes, and, wolf-like, tears and worries the white fleeces. Mirk woods sway mournfully their naked arms, and grind and moan without; the ivy taps unceasingly against the pane, as though entreating shelter.

The whole earth lies cold and dead beneath its snow-shroud, and yet the snow falls and falls, flake by flake, soft and noiseless in its white malice, like a woman's hate upon her rival.

It hides the stars, it dims the moon, it dulls the murmur of the river to which the Park slopes down, and whose voice the frost has striven in vain to hush these three weeks. Only the Christmas-bells are heard, now faint, now full--that sound more laden with divine regret than any other that falls on human ear. Like one who, spurring from the battle-field, proclaims “The fight is ours, but our great chief is slain!” there is sorrow in that message of good tidings; and not only for pious Christian folk; in every bosom it stirs some sleeping memory, and reminds it of the days that are no more. No wonder, then, that such music should touch my Lady's heart--the widowed mistress of Mirk Abbey. Those Christmas-bells which are also wedding-bells, remind her doubtless of the hour when Sir Robert lifted her lace-veil aside, and kissed her brow before all the people in the little church by the sea, and called her for the first time his Wife. He will never do so more. He has been dead for years. But what of that? Our dead are with us still. Our acts, our dealings with the world, form but a portion of our lives; our thoughts still dwell with those dear ones who have gone home before us, and in our dreams they still are our companions. My Lady is not alone in her private chamber, although no human being is there besides herself. Her eyes are fixed upon the fire, and in its flame she sees a once-loved face invisible to others, whose smile has power to move her even to tears. How foolish are those who ascribe romance to Youth alone —to Youth, that has scarcely learned to love, far less to lose! My Lady is five-and-forty at the least, although still comely; and yet there are memories at work within that broad white brow, which, for interest and pathos, outweigh the fancies of a score of girls. Even so far as we—the world—are acquainted with her past, it is a strange one, and may well give her that thoughtful air.

Lady Lisgard, of Mirk Abbey, has looked at life from a far other station than that which she now occupies. When a man of fortune does not materially increase his property by marriage, we call the lady of his choice, although she may have a few thousand pounds of her own, “a girl without a sixpence.” But Sir Robert Lisgard did literally make a match of this impecunious sort. Moreover, he married a very “unsuitable young person;” by which expression you will understand that he was blamed, not for choosing a bride very much junior to himself, but for not selecting her from the proper circles. When accidentally interrogated by blundering folks respecting her ancestry, the baronet used good-humouredly to remark, that his wife was the daughter of Neptune and Thetis. When asked for her maiden name, he would reply drily: “She was a Miss Anna Dyomene;” for the simple fact was, that she had been thrown up almost at his feet by the sea—the sole survivor of a crowded emigrant-ship that went to pieces before his eyes while he was staying one stormy autumn at a sea-side village in the South. Lashed to a spar, the poor soul came ashore one terrible night in a very insufficient costume, so as to excite the liveliest compassion in all beholders. There was a subscription got up among some visitors of fashion to supply her with a wardrobe; and they do say that Sir Robert Lisgard's name is still to be seen set down with the rest of the benevolent donors, for five pounds, in the list that is kept among the archives of the village post-office.

But it was not until three years afterwards that he bought her a trousseau; for the baronet, intending to make her his wife not only in name—a companion for life, and not a plaything, which is prized so long as it is new, and no longer—caused Lucy Gavestone, during the greater part of that interval, to be educated for her future position. If it was madness in him, as many averred, to marry so far beneath him, there was much method in his madness, Not ashamed of her as a bride, he was resolved not to be ashamed of her as the mistress of his house, or as the mother of his children, if it should please Heaven to grant him issue. It was in France, folks said, that her Ladyship acquired those manners which subsequently so excited the envy of the midland county in which she lived. She bore the burden of the honours unto which she was not born as gracefully as the white rose in her blue-black hair. But to perform her loving duties as a mother, in the way even her enemies admitted that she did perform them, could scarcely have been learned in France. Only love and natural good sense could have taught her those. Never once had Sir Robert Lisgard cause to regret the gift which the sea had given him. He used, however, smilingly to remark, in his later years —and his words were not without their pathos then—that he wished that he could have married his Lucy earlier, and while he was yet a young man; but in that case she would have been fitter for the font than the altar, inasmuch as there was a quarter of a century between their respective ages. He always averred that five-and-twenty years of his manhood had been thrown away.

But good wife and matron as Lady Lisgard had been, she was no less excellent a widow and mother. If Sir Robert could have risen from that grave in Mirk churchyard, where he had preferred to lie, rather than in the family vault, so that she might come to visit him in his lonely sleep, and daily lay a flower or two, culled with her own hands, upon him—not perhaps unconscious of that loving service—he would have found all things at the Abbey as he would have wished them to be during life: that is, so far as she could keep them so. Sir Richard, their eldest son, was within a few months of his majority, and, of course, had become in a great degree his own master; not that he misused his years so as to place himself in opposition to his mother, for he was a gentleman above everything; but he was of a disposition more haughty and stern than her kindly nature could well cope with, and she nervously shrank from any contest with it, although, on a question of principle—which, however, had not occurred—she might have braved even him.

Walter Lisgard, the younger son, was as genial and good-humoured as his father before him, and although (in common with every one who knew her) loved and respected my Lady, it must be confessed that he was too openly his mother's favourite, as he was the favourite of all at Mirk, in the Abbey or out of it.

Lastly, there was Letty Lisgard—but she shall speak for her sweet self. While her mother sits and thinks before her fire, there is a knock at the chamber-door, and on the instant the picture in her brain dissolves, which was affecting her so deeply, and she has no eyes save for her only daughter. A girl of seventeen enters the room, not gaily, as would have become her age, but with a certain gentle gravity that becomes her at least as well, since it is impossible to imagine that she could look more lovely. Fair as a lily, but not pale, for her usually delicate colour is heightened by some mental emotion, which causes, too, the little diamond cross upon her bosom to rise and fall, and the hazel eyes to melt and glitter beneath their dark lashes; lithe and tall as a sapling wooed too roughly by the north wind, she glides in, with her fair head slightly bowed, and casting herself upon her knees beside my Lady, exclaims: “Ah, do not weep, dear mother—do not weep!” at the same time herself bursting into a passion of tears. “I knew what you would be thinking of,” continues she, “upon this sad night, and therefore I came to comfort you a little, if I could. If not a merry Christmas, let me at least wish you a happy one, my own dear mother. I am sure that if dear papa can see us now, he wishes you the same.”

“Yes, dearest Letty, that is true. How thoughtful and kind it was of you to leave your friend—breaking off, no doubt, some pleasant chat over school-days”——

“Nay, mother,” interrupted the girl; “what is Rose to me in comparison with you? Was it likely that I should forget this anniversary of our common loss!”

Lady Lisgard did not answer in words, but shedding by the wealth of golden brown hair that had fallen over her daughter's forehead, she kissed that pure brow tenderly. Upon her own cheeks, a crimson flush, called thither by the young girl's words, was lingering yet. Reader, happy are you if you have never known a loving voice say: “What are you thinking of, dearest?” expecting to receive the answer: “Of you,” when you have no such reply to give—when your mind has been wandering far from that trustful being, and perhaps even whither it should not have wandered. Such a flush may then have visited your cheeks, as now touched those of Lady Lisgard, although it is certain that memory never played her so false as to remind her of aught whereof she need have been ashamed. The fact was, she had not been thinking of Sir Robert at all, albeit it was upon that very day, five years back, that she had received from his failing hand its last loving pressure, and in that very room. Human nature cannot be trained like those wondrous mechanical inventions of the monks, that indicated the fasts and festivals of the church so accurately—to suffer or rejoice at particular times and seasons; we are often sad when the jest is upon our lips, and bear a light heart beneath the sackcloth. Lady Lisgard's thoughts had, Heaven knew, been far from merry ones; but because she had not been mourning with chronological propriety, her woman's heart unjustly smote her with a sense of want of fealty to the memory of him for whom she still wore—and intended to wear to her dying day—the visible tokens of regret.

It is the fashion to jeer at widows; but, to a reverent mind, there are few things more touching than that frequent sight in honest England—a widowed mother, whose only joy seems to be in what remains to her of her dead lover, husband, counsellor—his children; and the only grief that has power to wring whose heart, past sense of common pain through the dread anguish that it has once undergone, arises from their misfortunes and misdoings. Ah, selfish boy, beware how you still further burden that sorrow-laden soul!—ah, thoughtless girl, exchange not that faithful breast too hastily for one that may spurn your head in the hour of need!

My Lady—for that was what we always called her about Mirk—was neither more nor less fortunate with her children than most mothers. They all three loved her; but they did not all love one another. Between Sir Richard and Walter was only a year of time, but upon it had arisen a thousand quarrels. The former thought that the privilege of an elder brother was a divine right, extending over every circumstance of fraternal life; the latter conceived it to be an immoral institution, borrowed in an evil hour from the Jews, and one to be strictly kept within its peculiar limits—themselves more than sufficiently comprehensive—the inheritance of the family title, and the succession to the landed estates.

“Where are Richard and Walter, Letty?” asked Lady Lisgard, breaking a long silence. “They, too, have been always mindful, like yourself, of this sad day.”

“They are mindful still, dear mother. I hear Walter's foot in the corridor even now.”

A swift elastic footfall it was, such as is very suggestive of the impulsive nature of him who uses it; for a phlegmatic man may move swiftly on rare occasions—such as bayonets behind him, or a mad bull—but there will be no more elasticity in his gait, even then, than in that of a walking-doll; whereas every step of Captain Walter Lisgard had a double action, a rise and fall in it, independent of the progressive motion altogether.

He was of a slim, yet not delicate build; his every movement (and, as I have said, there was plenty of it) had a native grace like that of a child; childlike and trustful, too, were those blue eyes; soft in their expression as his sister's, while he stooped down to kiss his mother's cheek, scarce more smooth than his own. Upon his lip, however, was a fairy moustache, which being, fortunately, coal-black like his somewhat close-cropped hair, made itself apparent to all beholders, and rescued his comeliness from downright effeminacy. But no woman ever owned a softer voice, or could freight it with deeper feeling than Walter Lisgard.

“God bless you, dearest mother, and give you all the good you deserve!” murmured he tenderly.

“And God bless you, my darling!” answered Lady Lisgard, holding him at the full distance of her white and rounded arms, clasped with two costly jewels, which had a worth, however, in her eyes far beyond their price, being Sir Robert's wedding-gift. “Ah me! how you remind me of your father's picture, Watty, taken on the day when he came of age. I trust you will grow up to be like him in other respects, dear boy.”

“I hope so, mother; although,” added he, with a sudden petulancy, “there will be a vast difference between us in some things, you know. He was an only son, whereas I am not even an eldest one; and when I come of age, there will be no picture taken, nor any fuss made, such as is to happen in June, I hear, upon Richard's majority.”

“Walter, Walter!” exclaimed Lady Lisgard reprovingly, “this is not like yourself, for it's envious—and—and—covetous!”——

“At all events, it is very foolish, mother,” interrupted the young man drily; “for what can't be cured must be endured.”

“And very, very cruel to me,” added Lady Lisgard.

“Then I am sincerely sorry I spoke,” returned Walter hastily, the moodiness upon his features chased away at once by loving regret. “Only, when a fellow leaves his regiment to spend Christmas-eve at home—as I am sure I was delighted to do, so far as you and Letty were concerned—he does not want to find there another commanding officer, uncommissioned and self-appointed.”

“Walter, Walter! this is very sad,” broke in Lady Lisgard piteously: “you know what is Richard's manner, and how much less kind it is than his true meaning. Can you not make some allowance for your own brother?”

“That's exactly what I said to him, mother,” answered Walter, laughing bitterly. “Here have I just got my troop, with no more to keep myself on than when I was a cornet, and had no back debts to speak of; and yet, so far from helping me a little, as Richard might easily do, by making some allowance for his own brother, he complains of that which you are so good as to let me have out of your own income. Why, that's not his business, if it were twice as much—although, I am sure, dear mother, you are liberality itself. Has he not got enough of his own—and of what should be mine and Letty's here, by rights—without grudging me your benevolences? Is he not Sir Richard Lisgard of Mirk Abbey?”——

“I will not listen to this, Walter,” cried his mother sternly. “This is mere mean jealousy of your elder brother.”

“Oh, dear no, mother; indeed, it is not that,” answered the young man coldly. “I envy him nothing. I hold him superior to me in no respect whatever; and that is exactly why I will not submit to his dictation. Here he comes stalking along the gallery, as though conscious that every foot of oak belongs to him, and every picture on the wall.”

It was undoubtedly a firm determined step enough—unusually so, for one so young as Sir Richard. The face of the new-comer, too, was stern almost to harshness; and as he entered the room, and beheld Walter standing by his mother's side, his features seemed to stiffen into stone. A fine face, too; more aristocratic if not so winning as his younger brother's, and not without considerable sagacity: if his manner was not graceful, it had a high chivalric air about it which befitted his haughty person very well. When he taught himself submission (a rare lesson with him), as now, while he raised his mother's fingers to his lips, and kissed them with dutiful devotion, it would have been hard to find a man with a more noble presence than Richard Lisgard.

“A merry Christmas and a happy New Year to you, mother.” The words, though conventional, had an earnest kindness, which came from the heart. Lady Lisgard kissed him fondly.

“Thank you, dear Richard,” said she; “but, alas! no Christmas can be a merry one, no year a happy one, when I see my children disagree.”

“Ah, Master Walter has been here before me, I see,” quoth Sir Richard bitterly, “stealing, like Jacob, his mother's blessing from her first-born, and giving his own account of matters. But please now to listen to my version.”

“Not to-night, Richard,” exclaimed Lady Lisgard with deep emotion. “Let not tonight, sacred to the memory of your common father, be a witness to your mutual accusations. In this room, almost at this very hour, but a few years back, he died, bequeathing you with his last breath to my tenderest care. Here it was that you kissed his white lips, weary with prayers for your future welfare; here it was that you promised, in return, to be good and dutiful sons. I know—I think, at least—that you both love your mother. No, I will kiss neither of you while thus unreconciled. That was not all that he required of you: he would have bidden you, could he have looked forward to this evil time, to love one another also; and O Richard! O Walter! hark to those bells, that seem to strive to beat their message into the most stubborn ears. Do you not hear what they say?—Letty, dear, do you tell them, then, for there are no lips better suited to deliver it.”

The young girl lifted up her head from her mother's lap, to gaze into her eyes; then, with exquisite pathos and softness, repeated, like a silver peal of bells: “Peace and good-will, peace and good-will, peace and good-will to all mankind.”

Sir Richard looked at his brother fixedly, but no longer in wrath. “It is my part to make the first advance,” said he, “although I was not the first to quarrel;” and he frankly stretched forth his hand.

The other paused a second; then reading on his mother's anxious lips: “For my sake, Walter,” he grasped his brother's fingers. There was grace in the very delay, as in the motion tenderness and genial ease, but scarcely the warmth of reconciliation. It was more like the action of a woman who wishes to please; and if you had seen the small hand apart from its owner, as it lay with its one glittering ring half hid in the other's huge white palm, you would have said it was a woman's hand.