gcls_courant_001 2

2 THE COURANT; A SOUTHERN LITERARY JOURNAL.

him there. Come," said Mr. Morton, "come and look at
him as he sleeps. But, for God's sake, do not make any
noise."

We walked on tip-toe to the door of the library: Mr.
Morton very gently pulled it open, and we entered.

The friend of my youth had changed but little since I
had seen him last. His long, glossy locks of raven-black
hair were brushed back, and displayed his wide, prominent
forehead. In truth, I have never seen so intellectual a face
as that of Henry Morton. His perfectly-cut features, the
fine aquiline nose, the delicate chin, the maidenly mouth,
the beautiful white brow, all looked superbly in his present
position. His left hand lay upon his broad chest, and on
the third finger glistened a large, antique diamond ring.
Just before him, and immediately beneath the magnificent
chandelier, was a large round table, covered with books of
all sizes and descriptions; and among them, were prints,
photographs and various manuscripts, some on letter-paper
and others on large legal cap; the latter, I saw at a glance,
were the lucubrations of my friend on the most serious and
unanswered difficulties of society as it exists, and the great
interests of life. I looked at the ponderous volumes which
lay upon the table; there lay Iamblicus, Censarinus de die
natali close by the works of mystical Origen and irresistible
St. Augustine, surrounded with Paracelsus, Albertus magnus
and Scaramello's "Directorium mysticum," hard by Lammenais,
Mœhler and Newman. This motley collection
showed me precisely what afflicted my friend; it was, I
thought, too much study, too much thought. While i was
moving around the table, a volume of Origen fell heavly on
the floor and aroused him from his sleep. He sat up on teh
couch, and instead of rubbing his eyes or looking at all
surprised, he arose almost instanly, and advanced to greet
me. His father left the room, unobserved by Henry, who
was entirely occupied with me. Of course, a few minutes
at the beginning were extremely unpleasant. I knew that
he must have understood why I was there, and he hesitated,
beacuse he literally knew that I was about to take issue with
him on the subject of his idiosyncrasy. He began, however,
to tell me about the various charms of Miss Travis' mind,
person and manners; and, after detailing most circumstan-
tially his adventures and pleasures in her company, he paused
all at once, and hurriedly paced the room. I felt that this
was the trying moment, so i said nothing, as I saw that
Henry was embarrassed beyond measure. After a few
minutes' pause, he said, "I would have married her, except
for the fact—that—that—I must die so very soon."

"Die so very soon!" I answered,—nonsense! you don't
look like a dying man."

He stopped suddenly, and looked at me with a wild stare,
as I said that, and then turning to the library, took down a
large black volume, which I saw, as he laid his hand upon
it, was a Bible.

"Once," said Morton, in a hissing, thrilling tone, "once,
the fashion was to find out the fates of men by "sortes Virgilianæ;"--our family solve them by Bible-lots. I closed my
eyes, I prayed for Divine help, I opened the book, put my
third finger on a place on one of the pages, and then I
opened my eyes and read this sentence, 'A THREE-FOLD CORD
IS NOT QUICKLY BROKEN.' This you will find in Ecclesiastes,
the fourth chapter and twelfth verse. This was my
lot, when, with two of my fellow-students, we opened the
Bible to see our fates: and both of their's have been already
fulfilled.

"But, Henry," I interrupted, "how does that prove that
your death is so near?"

He looked sadly at his costly volumes, and said, with a
sigh—"It is the fate of our race; the ternary influence is irresistible;
all things happen to us by triads. Every marriage,
every birth, every death in our family occurs in some triad:
one member of our race is married this year, two others
are sure to be; and so of births; but, alas! of deaths the
rule is different—one MUST die every third year, on the third
day of the third month. In our whole record as a family,
there is not a single exception; and they die thus; the third
son dies, then either the second or fourth, and the first
child must [die] third. The third child of my father died six
years ago, [the] fourth died three years ago, and the first must
die on next Saturday." He opened the large family Book,
and at the [ready] showed me the dates, all of which were
precisely as he had said. I sat perfectly horror-stricken
with silence.

"My friend," said Morton, "do not look so sadly; I must
die, and I know it. I hope that I may be ready to give my
account. Still, I scarcely know what I ought to believe as to
the future, for I have read dispassionately all the views of
every sect, and every section of every sect, and while, as yet, I
accept none, I can see the same truth glimmering through all;
evil must be punished somewhere, good must be rewarded
some time. If I be wrong in my judgement, I cannot help
it—'religious in mine error'—I must be convinced that I am
wrong, as my first duty is Loyalty to Truth. With me"
(he spoke in a melancholy tone,) "Faith and Reason,
Authority and Individuality, are always at war. They
fight, too, as the Choctaws fight duels—their left hands are
tied together, so that one must fall, or, perchance, BOTH."

"Our's is an ancient family," he said, quickly and evidently wandering in mind, "very ancient, and our records all
show this fearful influence of triads. Pardon me, I forgot
that I had commenced to tell you my precise religious standpoint:
however, I might as well not speak at all of that, as I
am still in darkness on all these topics. I have [read] in all
schools, and while I believe in none, altogether, I see truth
in all. Trillistos! trillistos!!" he exclaimed, in a louder
tone, and paced the floor rapidly. "Love! Love! unutterable
ænigma, bliss and curse of man! Oh, how I loved her, my
friend, and yet, in vain. Not that she was indifferent to me;
no, would to God that she had been! She returned my frantic
passion, and even now, after I have told her that I must
die, I fear that she will come, and make my death even
darker and more sad by the passing flash of her glorious
presence. My God! incomprehensible three in one, why
was I ever born?"

He walked rapidly back and forth, displaying in his
movements a beautiful figure, perfectly moulded, slight
round and admirably proportioned. I thought a moment of
his superb physique, his well-known moral traits, and his
astonishing mental powers, and I said to myself, "if ever man
deserved pity, this is he."

Morton now ceased to walk, and, after a moment's hesitation,
he looked into a volume of Epiphanius, and, turning
abruptly to me, said: "You are too good a scholar for me
to undertake to instruct you that THREE was the perfect
number of the ancients. Hermes, my master is called, as
you know Tismegistus: three were the Fates, the Graces,
and three times three (in triads separate) the Muses. God
himself is a mysterious union of Three in One, according to
any doctrine of Christianity. Day has her triad, morning,
noon and night; Time has her's, in tenses past, present, and
future; Life has three divions, youth, manhood, age. So,
also, our history will have three parts, birth, death and resurrection;
the archangels are Michael, Gabriel, Raphael:
three are the orders of the Church: bishop, priest and deacon:
three kings of the East came to adore the infant
Saviour, and the name of Antichrist has the number 666!
Triple is the tiara on the brow of the soverign Pontiff, 'thrice
holy' was the cry of 'Sanctus,' and Peter denied his master
thrice. The powers of the mind are three, Imagination,
Reason, Memory; the three studies of grammar, logic, rhetoric,
make up the trivium, and woman's holy life is in three
divisions, when all is experienced of change on earth, as
maid, wife and widow. On the tripod the oracles of old were
announced, the triplet is the glory and the ænigma of music,
the tri-color is the oriflamme of Liberty! Great minds are
only in triads; see, for example, the three great masters of
human sympathy are Homer, David and Shakespare; the
chief of the sublime poets are Æschylus, Dante, Milton; the
leaders of Philosophy are Aristotle, Bacon, Kant.

Our religion has its three periods, the Adamic, the Mosaic,
the Christian; three were the representative men of Christ's
gospel, John, Peter, and Paul; three were the prophets who
had clearly foretold him, (and yet called the three greater,)
Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel; three were the great doctors of
struggling Christianity, Jerome, Augustin and Chrysostom.
Three were the great orators, Demosthenes, Cicero, Mirabeau;
three were the great [world-sub?], Alexander, Cæsar, Napoleon;
three the great historians, Thucidydes, Ivy, and Macaulay,
(they will rank alike, a century hence) three, the great
artists of poetry, Euripides, Corneille, Goethe; three great
poets of love, Anacreon, Petrarch, Beauger; three were
the suffering penitents, the Baptist, St. Simeon Stylites and
the Abbe Rance; three are the great days of the Church,
Christmas, Good-Friday and Easter; three were our great
American statesmen, Calhoun, Webster and Clay; so in Sculpture,
in Music, in Painting, in all their sub-divisions, all go
by triads; three is the perfect number, and I can prove it to
you."

Here Morton's manner became perfectly wild with excitement;
he showed all sorts of strange sentences culled from
Origen and Scaramello, from Augustin and Paracelsus, from
Albertus magnus and Aristotle. I was completely amazed,
and gazing vacantly at the floor, when suddenly a low, moaning,
female voice attracted my attention. Poor Morton was
too busy with his references to observe anything else, and
consequently I could make my observations without at all
disturbing his occupation. I looked around, and at the door
of the library a young lady, apparently about twenty years
of age, stood wringing her hands in despair. Her large,
lustrous eyes were swimming in tears, her cheeks flushed,
and her beautiful brow knitted with sorrow and surprise.
She was in her traveling-dress, and I at once concluded that
this was none other than the beloved Miss Travis, whose
advent poor Henry so much feared. I made an imploring
sign to her to retire, and to do so as quietly as possible.
She instantly comprehended my meaning, and left the aparttment
as silently as she had entered, while Henry was eagerly
quoting from Origen, what to me seemed a most mystical, far-fetched
explanation of a matter which concerned no human
being in any possible particular.

"You see from this," he resumed, with great earnestness
"that three represents in itself unity, opposition, and the combination
of the two; thesis, antithesis and synthesis. Thus,
all things have three parts, beginning, middle, end: all
heavenly bodies rise, culminate, set: all things as to locality
are above, amidst, or below: as in Christian perfection we find
three elements of Faith, Hope and Charity. Three were
the angels that visited Abraham, three were the friends of
Job, three were the tabernacles of Peter; three are the
angels in Apocalypse who are yet to sound the trumpet; on
the third day Christ arose from the dead; three were the
classes of men in the great Parable of the Samaritan; thrice
was Paul beaten. Three-stringed was the magic lyre of
old; three-forked was the trident; three-headed was Cerberus,
and three-fold the virgin Diana. Well might the wise
men say, funiculus triplex difficile rumpitur.' This three-fold
chord, so hard to break, binds my fated race, and without the
possibility of escape; and on next Saturday, to fulfill this
mysterious doom, I go to complete another triad."

He paused for a reply: but, seeing that I was lost in
doubt and utter irresolution as to what I should say to him,
he hurriedly said, "And yet, the wisdom of all ages has said
'Love is stronger than death.' On what was that strange
saying based? was it because a friend would gladly die to
save a friend? because the world knows of a Damon and
Pythias, or had dreamed of an Alcestis?"

He pondered silently for a few moments, and then sighed
mournfully:

"The same wise man who said that a three-fold chord is not
easily broken, also said, 'Love is as strong as Death.' Love
is Genesis, Love is Alpha, Love, the true and only unity:—
but Death—inevitable, inexorable—how can Love be as
strong?"

I here imagined that I saw a faint gleam of hope. "Henry," said I, as earnestly as I could, "the true solution of your
difficulty is, as you must see, in Love. I grant that three,
the perfect number of the ancients, the sacred number of our
own religion, is a mystery. But the line reads, 'a three-fold
chord is not easily broken;' now, that implies that, although
there may be difficulty in breaking what you call ternary influence,
or the law of triads, in your family, still, it is entirely possible that it may be broken."

"Ha!" said he, quickly, "what is that?"

I repeated the sentence, and, granting that it was hard
to break the law of triads, insisted that the text contemplated
the possibility of breaking it.

Henry looked at me with blank amazement, and muttered,
"Nellie! Nellie!—trithales, . . . . . trithales: but
I must not hope against all common sense. Poor Miss
Travis declared that she intended to come to America
immediately, and said i should not die. She frightened