THE LOVES OF REALMAH AND THE AINAH.

I suppose that all those who have ever been in love feel that very little has been said or written that adequately represents what they have felt. This love is a wonderful thing; and we can never cease, when we are bystanders, to be astonished at the phenomenon,--that one human being should appear to another to include all the beauties and virtues of humanity; and that the love of the whole human race could, in no measure, satisfy him, or her, if the love of the one person loved was wanting.

Although lovers will not be satisfied with what has been said about love, we must admit that a few fine things have been said. For instance, that man spoke with some experience who said, that the test of loving is, that being with the loved person all talk is needless, and that the silence, which is embarrassing sometimes in the presence of the nearest friends and the dearest relatives, is perfect ease, and harmony, and comfort in the presence of the one beloved.

The Roman poet, too, has well described the feelings of a lover for his mistress, when he says--

“Illam, quicquid agit, quoquo Vestigia movit Componit furtim, subsequiturque decor; Seu solvit crines, fusis decet esse capillis, Seu compsit, comptis est veneranda comis. Urit seu Tyriâ voluit procedere pallâ, Urit seu niveâ candida veste venit.”

_Ellesmere._ I must at all hazards interrupt: Milverton once quoted those lines before; and, after long and anxious consultation with Ainsworth’s Latin Dictionary, I furnished a translation which has been much admired by great scholars:--

“Whether she wears a bonnet that is like a coal-scuttle; or whether she claps on a little platter that is attached to the back of her head: whether, gracefully, she trails after her in the muddy streets an ample sweep of flowing drapery; or whether, succinct and neat, she trips along in Bloomer costume: whether she allows her beautiful hair to fall in corkscrew ringlets round her enchanting face; or whether she throws it all back, and, with the aid of alien hair, forms a huge and overweighting lump behind:--she is equally fascinating, equally tiresome, and equally disposed to look in at all the haberdashers’ shops.”

[Milverton resumed.]

Steele, also, did not ill describe, though briefly, the charm of being with a woman whom he greatly admired when he said, “That to be much with her was in itself a liberal education.”

It was not ill said, either, by that man who exclaimed, “How much happier it is in absence to think of thee, than to be with any other person!”

Certainly there seems a good deal to be said for that theory ascribed to Plato, that the soul is dual, and that one half of it wanders about in the form of a man, and the other in the form of a woman. When these two parts meet, a thing which occurs but rarely, there is doubtless supreme felicity, as was the case with Realmah and the Ainah. But when severance comes, then the felicity must be amply avenged by the corresponding misery of desolation.

But oh! what cruel tricks does love play; and what mistakes and what misfortunes are comparable to those which are caused by its perversities! Granted that all the rest of human life were raised into a higher and a happier stage of being, love alone would leave the human race nearly as unhappy as it is. Suppose that climate, instead of being the dire thing (to be ever watched and contended with) which it is over the greater part of this globe, was entirely harmonious and beautiful: suppose, indeed, that everywhere and at all times it was like that which prevails during those few days in an American autumn, when serenity seems to rule over the land; when it is neither too hot nor too cold; when “never winds blow loudly;” and when all Nature, often so harsh, seems to subside into an unwonted lovingness and kindness--still, if the loving heart were not at peace, small would be the gain thereof. Granted too, that men could worship the Supreme Being without engaging to define His nature and His attributes, and to persecute all those who differ from them in the minutest particular when defining what is undefinable, and explaining what is inexplicable: granted too, that the life of man in great cities was not as inexpressibly sordid as it is, but that all men, from the lowest to the highest, were well housed and well cared for; that men were fed without the slaughter of the animal creation; that there were none of those excessive and hideous contrasts which now exist between the states of the rich and of the poor; and that the office of ruler, in any form or shape, was taken with reluctance, and only from a sense of duty, the ruling man feeling he was only the servant of those over whom he had the sway: granted all this, granted an Arcadia, granted an Atlantis, or any state of being for mankind that the wisest and most benevolent men in their juvenile dreams--alas! only in their juvenile dreams--have imagined: granted that the state of things pictured by the poet existed here (it may exist in some happier planet); that

“Qui Sdegno non s’accende, E soggionar non sa; La Colpa non offende, Trova l’Error pietá.

“L’Inganno quì non ride Nel mascara del Ver; Fra noi ciascun divide L’Affanno ed il Piacer.”

--granted that men loved their neighbours, and did not hate their enemies; that ill-natured criticism was not abundant; and that Christianity was not a name, but a reality,--still, if Cupid were left to play his strange, horrid pranks, the happiness of the world would by no means be assured.

Where the greatest error and mistakes arise is in forgetting that love is a thing of infinite variety.

At the moment I am writing, there are hundreds of ingenious and clever people weaving wonderful love tales to amuse the mind; but the love they portray is, for the most part, of the same kind. They exhaust their ingenuity in framing subtle obstacles to the fulfilment of the love, but they seldom dwell with much ingenuity on the different kinds of love.

I have been led to make these reflections while considering the love of Realmah for the Ainah, which was of a most singular description. To use a common expression, which is very forcible, he worshipped the very ground upon which she trod. He found with her alone the exquisite joy of a perfect companionship. He saw, and even exaggerated, all the grace and all the beauty, whatever they were, that she possessed. He admired her when she spoke. He was happy with her when she was silent. Whatever she did or said was pleasing in his eyes.[17] To her there was no need of long explanations from him. She understood him at once, and her soul was a twin-soul to his. They had none of the pretty quarrels and playful diversities of opinion which so often make love amusing to lovers; but she was sister, and counsellor, and companion, and comforter, partaking every hope, every trouble, every sorrow that was his.

Footnote 17:

The Sheviri, a nation rich beyond measure in proverbs, had one or two which illustrate the statement in the text, or its converse.

“The man you hate cannot take up his bit of meat with his fingers but you hate him more.”

And again this one--

“Akbal jumped into the water; but no man said that Akbal was wet”--meaning that a favourite can do anything without offence.

The Ainah possessed one very rare accomplishment: she was an admirable talker. How rare that accomplishment is, may be seen from the fact that throughout the civilized world, at the present time, there are more great musicians, great poets, and great painters, than there are consummate talkers.

This man repeats profusely; that man is dry and curt: one man is over-explanatory and indulges in parentheses, which are the death of good talk; another is unsympathetic, or egotistical, and his talk degenerates into an oration chiefly about himself and his own doings; while a third contrives to turn all conversation into mere argumentation or dispute. When we read of the remarkable women who have bewitched the world--the Aspasias, Cleopatras, the Ninons d’Enclos--we may simply conclude, not that they were much more beautiful than other women, but that they talked better.

This art has an especial attraction for men who, like Realmah, are somewhat melancholy. The beauty of it too is, that it does not need to have wonderful subjects to discourse about. It is beyond and above all erudition; and the commonest domestic tales are brightened up and made something of by a good talker. There are proverbs about speech being silver and silence being gold; but at the most they only apply to the conduct of business, or to the talk of dull people, for good talk is ever one of the choicest things in the world, and wins all people who come within its sphere. Now the Ainah, as we know, was not only profoundly ignorant, but even vulgar in her language; nevertheless her sweet and nimble talk, her sense of humour and of pathos, made the listener forget her vulgarities of speech.

No one could be more cautious than Realmah of showing how much he was enchanted with the Ainah’s conversation. When he returned home after his day’s work, if he had not seen the Ainah, he went first to the Varnah, listened to all she had to say about the furniture that had been spoiled, and the deficiency that there was in fuel or in food; he then listened to the pretty nothings or the cross comments of Talora; and then afterwards sauntered into the apartments of the Ainah, to be solaced by the wit and humour which flowed from her discreet and softly-speaking lips.

The Ainah, too, was equally careful to conceal that she had any pleasure in his society. She was not like the favourite slave of whom the poet says--

“Abra was ready, ere I named her name; And when I called another, Abra came.”

On the contrary, the Ainah never sought Realmah’s society, or showed any particular pleasure in it; and so there was a house in which there were three wives, and next to no jealousy. The Varnah knew that she was transcendent in the art of housekeeping, and looked upon all the others as children of whom she had to take care. Talora knew that she was beautiful, and cared for nothing else than that this should be acknowledged. The Ainah knew that she was loved, and that naturally sufficed for her.

There would probably be no such thing as jealousy if souls were visible, for we should then find that the love of any person for any other is so completely a peculiar relation between those two only, that there would be nothing for any third person to be jealous of. We are speaking now, of course, of the higher kinds of love.

I have said above, that the love of Realmah for the Ainah was singular in its character. It was singular, because it was so great, considering that there was so much in it which was but fraternal in its nature.

The truth is, that there was a little too much resemblance in their characters. They were both very subtle persons. The Ainah, as well as Realmah, had that peculiar characteristic which is best expressed in a Spanish word, “_Longanimidad_”--that is, that they were both of them people of great mental endurance; being long-continuing, patient, quiet haters, or lovers, or sufferers. They were alike also in the breadth of view with which they regarded any question, and in their freedom from being influenced by the opinions of the comparatively inferior people who surrounded them. They were thus a little too much alike to fulfil the condition which, according to Plato, has been laid down for perfect happiness in love.

Not that there is not always an immense difference between the masculine and the feminine soul, even when they are apparently cast in the same mould.

Realmah did not know all this. In fact, he was one of those men who all their lives remain very ignorant of the nature of women. We have seen how deluded he was in his estimate of Talora’s merits. But then great men are so easily deceived: indeed, you may often measure the greatness of the man by his liability to be deceived. Not if his attention is aroused; not if he brings the powers of his mind to bear upon the question; but, in the ordinary course of life, he is very apt to believe too much both in men and women.

Realmah, as I have said above, was happily unconscious of these fine distinctions and subtleties in love. He thought his Ainah perfection, and never imagined that a more joyous and more resonant nature--a nature that did not quite partake his aspirations, though it might sympathise with them--a nature that would even have permitted her sometimes, playfully and tenderly, to laugh at him and make fun of him--would, after all, have been a nature more fitted to amuse and distract him, and to lighten the burden of his cares.

The joy and comfort, however, that his Ainah was to Realmah at this critical period of his life were unspeakable. While he was at work in the forest he could, from the spot where his works were situated, obtain a view of a slight eminence which lay between his works and the town of Abibah. Evening after evening--for, alas! the Ainah began to be unable to come in the day-time--the descending sun threw its yellow rays upon the summit of that eminence; and a figure, which most people would not have thought remarkable for its grace or its beauty, made its way over the hill, walking in a certain resolute fashion--the Ainah having husbanded whatever little strength was left to her to appear strong to Realmah. That figure in his eyes, if in those of no other man, was pre-eminently attractive. He always paused in his work to regard it; and when it approached him, he looked to be cheered by the smiling welcome, and the truthful blue eyes, full of tender encouragement, which said to him, in that unwritten language well known amongst lovers, “If you have succeeded, I come to rejoice, as none other can rejoice, in your success; and, if you have failed, I come to tell you that your failure is only the failure of to-day, and that to-morrow must be brighter.”

It was a thing worth noticing, to see the cautious, wistful glance which the Ainah threw at the works, and then at her husband’s face, before she spoke to him, making up her mind as to the tenor of the few loving remarks which with low and sweet voice she would make to Realmah upon the labours of the day--her hand, now feverish and tremulous, softly clasped in his.

It is a bold assertion to make; but, such is the dulness of perception created by familiarity, that it may be asserted that we are often as unobservant of the change in the bodies of those we live with, as we are of their varying states of minds and of the movements of their affections.

Realmah, no doubt, noticed that the Ainah did not come in the day-time; but he did not attribute this to her failing strength, which prevented her from wandering about with him for hours. If he had been asked the cause of this change, he would have said that, though she was as much interested as ever in the result, the details of the work had probably by this time become rather wearisome to her. And he would perhaps have moralized upon the superior perseverance of men to women in dealing with these details--little imagining that to be with him was always pleasure enough for the Ainah; and that superintending the collection and distribution of these stones and the firewood was an employment at which she would never have grown weary as long as he was by her side.