Twice-Told Tales

's girlhood. That venerable lady chanced to be a spectator of the scene, and ever after made it her favorite narrative. Whether the edifice now standing on the same site be the identical one to wh

other forms of monumental marble, the tributes of private affection or more splendid memorials of historic dust. With suc

ys an indolent one, because his studies had no definite object either of public advantage or personal ambition; a gentleman, high-bred and fastidiously delicate, yet sometimes requiring a considerable relaxation in his behalf of the common rules of society. In truth, there were so many anomalies in his character, and, though shrinking with diseased sensibility from public notice, it had been his fatality so often

any uncommon delicacy of feeling had survived through such a life as Mrs. Dabney's; it could not but be crushed and killed by her early disappointment, the cold duty of her first marriage, the dislocation of the heart's principles consequent on a second union, and the unkindness of her Southern husband, which had inevitably driven her to connect the idea of his death with that of her comfort. To be brief, she was that wisest but unloveliest variety of woman, a philosopher, bearing troubles of the heart with equanimity,

in this late union of two early lovers which sometimes makes a fool of a woman who has lost her true feelings among the accidents of life. All the wonder was how the gentleman, with his lack of worldly wisdom and agonizing consciousness of ridicule, could have been induced to take a measure at once so prudent and so laughable. But while people talked the wedding-day arrived. The ceremony was to be solemnized according to the Episcopalian forms and in open church, with a deg

As they streamed up the broad aisle, while the pews and pillars seemed to brighten on either side, their steps were as buoyant as if they mistook the church for a ball-room and were ready to dance hand in hand to the altar. So brilliant was the spectacle that few took notice of a sing

omen!" whispered a yo

ts own accord. What has she to do with weddings? If you, dearest Julia, were approaching

ts, the silk, satin, brocade and embroidery, the buckles, canes and swords, all displayed to the best advantage on persons suited to such finery - made the group appear more like a bright-colored picture than anything real. But by what perversity of taste had the artist represented his principal figure as so wrinkled and decayed, while yet he had decked her out in the b

puff of wind which threatened to scatter the leaves of an old brown, withered rose on the same stalk with two dewy buds, such being the emblem of the widow between her fair young bridemaids. But her heroism was admirable. She had started with an irrepressible shudder, as if the stroke

rgyman at the altar. "But so many weddings have been ushered in with the merriest peal of the bells

at, to speak somewhat after his own rich style, he seems to hang the bridal-chamber in black and cut the wedding-garment out of a coffin-pall. And it has been the custom of divers nations to infuse somethin

atured merriment from the affair. The young have less charity for aged follies than the old for those of youth. The widow's glance was observed to wander for an instant toward a window of the church, as if searching for the time-worn marble that she had dedicated to her first husband; then her eyelids dropped over their faded orbs and her thoughts were drawn irresistibly to another grave. Two buried men with a voi

a train of several coaches was creeping along the street, conveying some dead man to the churchyard, while the bride awaited a living one at the altar. Immediately after, the footsteps of the brideg

dam," cried she. "For heaven

ear, "There is a foolish fancy that I cannot get rid of. I am expecting my b

the bridemaid. "What

peared another and another pair, as aged, as black and mournful as the first. As they drew near the widow recognized in every face some trait of former friends long forgotten, but now returning as if from their old graves to warn her to prepare a shroud, or, with purpose almost as unwelcome, to exhib

in sight. Many turned away their faces; others kept a fixed and rigid stare, and a young girl giggled hysterically and fainted with the laughter on her lips. When the spectral procession approached the altar,

lchral lamp; all else was fixed in the stern calmness which old men wear in the coffin. The corpse stood motionless, but a

ready; the sexton stands waiting for us at the door o

stood apart, shuddering at the mourners, the shrouded bridegroom and herself; the whole scene expressed by the stro

nce was first brok

ll. Your mind has been agitated by the unusual circumstances in which you are placed.

ed my aged and broken frame with scarlet and embroidery, had I forced my withered lips to smile at my dead heart, that might have been m

shroud with the glare and glitter in which she had arrayed herself for this unhappy scene. None that behe

groaned the hear

om, through which I walked wearily and cared not whither. But after forty years, when I have built my tomb and would not give up the thought of resting there - no, not for such a life as we once pictured - you call me to the altar. At your summons I am here. But other husbands have enjoyed your youth, your beauty, your warmth

art unused to it, that now wrought upon the bride. The stern lesson of the day

and emptiness, but at its close there is one true feeling. It has made me what I was in y

ear was gathering in his own. How strange that gush of human feeling from

us now, and we have realized none of our morning dreams of happiness. But let us join our hands before the altar as lovers whom adverse circumstances have separated thro

rough the whole till its deep voice overpowered the marriage-words, - all marked the funeral of earthly hopes. But as the ceremony proceeded, the organ, as if stirred by the sympathies of this impressive scene, poured forth an anthem, first mingling with the dis