University of Virginia Library

26. CHAPTER XXVI.

“My Child — If the injunction is
obeyed with which I shall consign to
my friend the box that is to contain this
letter, long before you behold it the hand
that now traces these lines will have
mouldered to dust—the eye that now,
as you lie on my bosom, pours its tears
like rain upon your sweet face, shall
weep no more for ever; and the heart
that now throbs with hopes and fears
for you, my love, shall have ceased to
beat with mortal anxieties and mortal
hopes.

“Sweet innocent — gift of God —
image of immaculate purity — thy mother
would preserve thee, an unsullied
treasure for the riches of Christ's kingdom—a
stainless flower for the paradise
of God: thy mother would shelter thee
so that the winds of heaven should not
breathe unkindly on thee. But this
cannot be. Thou must be exposed to
the dangers of human life, solicited by
its temptations, and pierced by its sorrows—and
thy mother, thy natural guard
and shield, must be taken from thee.
Thy mother can do nothing for thee——
Said I nothing!—God forgive me. I
can do—I have done all things—I have
resigned you to Him whose protection is
safety—whose favour is life. I have
believed his promises—I have accepted
his offered mercy; and in faith, and
nothing wavering, I have committed my
orphan child to Him. And now, though
thy path should be laid through the
waters, they shall not overwhelm thee,

and through the fire, it shall not kindle
upon thee.

“My child, I am now to account to
you for a resolution, which, should it
please God to preserve your life, must
materially affect your future destiny.

“I beseech you to permit no unkind
thoughts of your mother to enter your
gentle bosom. Remember that if I
deprive you of your rights, degrade you
from the station in which you were
born, and remove you from honours and
riches, it is that you may become an
`heir of the kingdom;' remember my
motive—read the brief history and unhappy
fate of your mother, and you
will not—must not blame her.

“My father's name was Philip Erwine.
He was a Scotchman by birth, the only
son of a rich and respectable family. He
was educated for the church, and preparing
to enter life with the most happy
prospects, when they were for ever
clouded by a clandestine marriage, which

the world deemed imprudent, and his
father unpardonable, with a portionless,
obscure girl, whose maiden name, Ellen
Bruce, I have given to you. My grandfather
discarded his son from his home
and his affections, and only cherished
the remembrance of this one act of disobedience.
Oh my child, the pride of
this world is cruel tyranny!

“My father subsisted for some months
on scanty remittances secretly made him
by his mother; but she died soon after.
My grandfather married again—had more
children—and my father, thus cut off
from all hope of reconciliation, emigrated
to America. My parents were
strangers in a strange land, and obliged
to meet the evils which the poor and
friendless must always encounter. My
father, nursed in the lap of indulgence,
sunk under privation, and became utterly
spiritless and dejected. My noble
mother, with an `inborn royalty of
mind' that makes the trappings of

earthly distinctions seem poor indeed,
endured all her trials without a murmuring
word, or even look. She made incredible
exertions for the support of her
family, and maintained an outward cheerfulness,
while her heart was sinking with
the consciousness of having been the
cause of my father's calamities. Her
health and life were the sacrifice. I
have since heard my father confess that
when he laid her in the grave, he was
first roused to a sense of my wants and
his duties.

“He left New-York, the scene of his
sufferings, and fixed his residence in a
village on Long-Island Sound. There
he obtained a comfortable living by
teaching the children of some gentlemen
whose summer residences were in the
vicinage. Whenever he was compelled
to be absent from me, I was left in the
care—the vigilant, maternal care, of the
kindest-hearted woman in the world,
who afterwards married a Mr. Allen,

and went to reside in Massachusetts.
I was the constant companion of my
father's solitude—the consolation, he
called me, of his exile. All the treasure
of his heart was lavished on me: I was
the refuge of his affections, and nurtured
with a thoughtful tenderness that quite
disqualified me for the indifference of a
selfish world—quite unfitted me for the
rude storm that has since assailed me,
and before which I have fallen.

“My father was a good man: adversity
had made him an humble Christian:
still he possessed the pride natural to
the human heart, and I, his only child,
was the object of all that pride. Yes,
my love, he was proud of thy mother's
beauty—that fatal beauty that has been
the source of all my griefs—that beauty
which is now perishing by disease, and
soon will be quite effaced by death.
Thank God, I was never proud of it: in
my simplicity, I was ignorant of its
value and its danger.

“My father would sometimes bewail
for me the loss of distinctions, which
were no loss to me, for I had never
known them; and in the joyous independence
of childhood, I could frolic away
his sadness, and prove to him, by the
contentment of my spirit, the vanity of
his desires.

“I had just attained my fourteenth
year when I lost my father. I pass
over that period of my life. My support
—my defence was taken from me—the
world was all before me, and I would
gladly have turned back and laid me in
my father's grave. Thank heaven, my
child, there is a misery you cannot feel!

“My father did not leave me without
a provision. Tender as the parent bird
that plucks the down from its own breast
to feather the nest for its young, he had
practised the severest economy—deprived
himself of every, the least indulgence,
that he might reserve his small
earnings for my sake.

“Mrs. Allen, to whose guardianship
my father had left me, sent me to a
boarding-school to acquire some slight
accomplishments, which she hoped,
with the solid instruction I had already
received, would qualify me for a teacher,
and thus secure to me the means of
permanent independence. I had been
one year at school—my education was
finished, or rather my small means were
expended, when a Mrs. Westall came
with her husband from Virginia to visit
her northern friends. Though some
years older than I, we had been playmates
in our childhood. She remembered
with kindness our youthful intimacy.
My youth and loneliness interested
her husband's benevolent heart:
he invited me to accompany his wife to
the south, and promised, if I became
dissatisfied with my home in his family,
to obtain for me among his rich neighbours
an agreeable situation as teacher.

“Now, my child, your mother claims

your pity, your sympathy, your forgiveness,
while you read the record of
an indiscretion that casts her into an
early grave, and condemns you to
orphanage.

“The day after our arrival at Mr.
Westall's plantation, I had stolen just
at sunset into the garden with my friend's
little boy, Charles Westall—the thought
of this child throws a bright gleam across
the track of memory, and I pause to
dwell on it as the traveller in a desert
lingers to pluck a sweet and solitary
flower. Scarcely less a child than himself,
I was the favourite companion of
his sports. He had chased me through
the walks, and having caught me, he
made me kneel on a turfed bank, that he
might, as he said, crown me his queen.
He pulled the comb from my hair, and
was weaving knots of honey-suckles and
rosebuds among my curls, when we
were startled by the rustling of the
branches of some high shrubs behind
which we had retreated. We both looked

up and perceived a gentleman, a stranger,
gazing intently on us.

“Little Charles sportively drew the
branches around me, saying, `this is my
Mary, my queen—and nobody shall
look on her till she is crowned.”'

“`Such a nymph,' said the stranger,
`should have a guardian angel and a
sylvan veil.'

“These were the first words I ever
heard from your father; this was the
first time I ever saw him, and from this
moment he was never absent from my
thoughts: wherever I was, in society or
in solitude, Henry Redwood's voice rung
in my ears; his image was for ever before
me. Look, my child, at the picture
which you will find with this letter:
look on those eyes—the lofty brow—the
mouth—and then imagine what his face
must have been, when kindled with the
inspiration of the living spirit.

“I was young and ignorant—artless
and unsuspicious—constantly exposed
to the charms of his genius and accomplishments—to

the fascinations of his
tenderness—and if I had ever doubted
(which I did not) that he was all that he
seemed, his being the friend of Mr.
Westall would have quieted my fears.

“Here I have paused to look over what
I have written, and I blush at my own
inconsistency. I blame myself, and yet
I seek a justification in my child's eyes;
this is natural, for alas! the heart is deceitful.
But I will do so no more—I
will tell the simple truth, and trust to
my child's heart to plead for her mother.

“Not many months elapsed before I
married Mr. Redwood clandestinely,
and without much scruple or reluctance.
Every sentiment of duty and propriety
was lost in the fervour of a first attachment,
and in the fearless confidence
which youth and love inspired.

“He urged the necessity of secresy,
and assigned many reasons for it. I received
them implicitly, or scarcely listened
to them, for I had cast the care of

my honour and happiness upon him, and
my affection was unclouded by a single
doubt or anxiety.

“Soon after our marriage, Mr. Westall
died suddenly—the kindness of Mrs.
Westall detained me with her for some
time: I then left her to take charge of
the children of a Mr. Emlyn, whose
plantation adjoined that of my husband's
father. Our opportunities of meeting,
though somewhat diminished by my
residence with strangers, were still frequent,
but they exposed me to suspicions
and remarks that made me
miserable.

“The last time I saw my husband I
confessed my anxieties to him. I even
hinted my expectation of your existence;
that I believe he did not understand, and
I had not courage to explain myself. I
observed that he felt unusual emotion at
parting with me, and the next morning
I received the information that he had
gone on a tour of pleasure to Europe, to

be absent one or two years. With this
intelligence, which almost deprived me
of my senses, your father sent me, by
mistake, some letters that had passed
between him and one of his friends,
from which I discovered that while he
felt some tenderness for me, he regretted
that he had encumbered himself with an
insuperable obstacle to his advancement
in the world.

“He was the world to me—and I
found myself worse than insignificant to
him. Every fibre of my affections was
clasped around him, and I was thus in a
moment rudely torn away: poverty I
had never dreaded — calamity in any
other shape I could have borne—but I
merited the chastisement. I also discovered
from these fatal letters that your
father was an unbeliever; not merely
that he rejected the truths of revelation,
but that he could even treat a future retribution
and the hope of immortality as
childish illusions.

“Oh, how then, in the bitterness of
my sorrow and disappointment, did I
blame myself that I had so long forgotten
my Christian duty, and had looked upon
my husband's indifference to religion (for
his unbelief I never suspected,) as what
was to be expected in a young man.
My child, I deserved my fate—I was
born of a Christian mother, watched and
guided by a Christian father—religious
principles were deeply rooted in my
heart; and yet for awhile every thought
of duty was suspended—every affection
was melted into one deep absorbing
passion—my whole existence was resolved
into one sensation—alas, this it is
to love!

“As soon as I became sufficiently
tranquil to think of the future, I took a
resolution to go to Philadelphia, without
any very definite purpose but to hide
myself from every one who had ever seen
me, and to escape from a scene where
every object renewed my anguish, and

where I was no longer capable of performing
the duties I had undertaken.

“Oh that terrible journey!—I was
alone and unprotected, and so young and
so wretched, that every body noticed
me, and I had such mortifications and
trials to endure! But I will not make
your heart bleed by relating them—why
should I? they are past for ever.

“The journey was fatiguing to me—
my sorrows preyed on my health, and
before I reached Philadelphia, I was
seized with a nervous fever, which obliged
me to remain at a German settlement.
I recovered partially from it, but
it left my mind in a state of alternate
apathy and insensibility, which rendered
removal impossible. I hired a
lodging in a very poor German family,
where I awaited my confinement. I
was careless about my life, and took no
thought for my health, which ordinary
attention might perhaps have restored,

but long fastings and sleepless nights,
when my weary spirit knew no rest,
have wasted my strength; and now I
would give worlds for a little space of
that life which my wilful neglect, and
my guilty despair have destroyed.

“Your birth, awakened me to a new
existence—breathed a new spirit into
me—created ties to life; and from the
first moment I folded you to my bosom,
I would have accepted existence on any
terms: no condition, however deserted
and neglected, has now any terrors for
me. All other feelings and desires are
extinguished in the pure flame of maternal
love, and for you, my child, alone I
would live.

“But it cannot be—a terrible cough
racks my frame—the fires of consumption
are kindled on my cheek, and every
day I see and feel the steady and sure
approach of death—I weep over you,
and the kind creatures that are about

me weep to see me, and the long silent
watches of the night I pass in praying
for you.

“In my still solitude, when thou wast
sleeping all unconscious on my bosom, I
have heard a voice saying unto me,
`leave thy child with me.' I have
obeyed the voice—I have resigned you
to the protection of that good Being,
who in tender compassion hast declared
himself the orphan's God.

“And now it is deeply impressed on
my mind that I ought to do something
to preserve my lamb from the danger of
wandering from the fold of the good
Shepherd. Your father, by deserting
me, has forfeited his right to you. When
I am no longer in the way of his worldly
prospects, his heart may be touched
with compunction for the wrong he has
done me; you might awaken a parent's
feelings, and he might invest you with
your rights.

“All this might be—and what would

you gain? the unwilling sufferance—the
scanty favour, it may be, of a proud and
selfish family; for such, from the confession
of your father, are his connexions.
But for this shall I expose
you to the danger, the almost inevitable
certainty, of alienation from the christian
hope?

“It must not be—I behold something
in your innocent face—the emblem of
heaven—I feel something in the soft
touch of your little hand that appeals to
your mother's heart to direct your course
in the path that leads to the mansions in
our Father's house.

“I have at last taken an immoveable
resolution to keep your existence a secret
from your father, and to preserve from
you, and from every one, the knowledge
of my connexion with him till you are
of an age when you will be secure from
his influence—when your character will
be formed by wise and christian care.

“You must not, my child, think

hardly of me for keeping you so long in
ignorance of your parentage—I dare not
leave any thing to hazard—the very
young do not know how to choose good
from evil, and heaven preserve you from
the hard school of experience in which
your poor mother has been taught!”

Here there occurred a blank in the
letter; and the remainder (scarcely
legible) was as follows:—

“Since writing the above, I have
been too weak to use my pen. In the
meantime my kind, generous, best
friend, Mrs. Allen, has complied with a
request I sent her, and come to me from
her distant home. Ah, how has she
grieved to find me so sick, and in this
mean lodging; but I have not suffered
from its poverty, and I chose it that I
might not diminish the pittance I have
saved for you—the remnant of the liberal
supply my husband sent me at his
departure.

“I have found in this humble dwelling
all the kindness I needed, and have
enjoyed an inward peace that springs
from the reflection that I have for you,
my child, sacrificed earth to heaven.

“Mrs. Allen remonstrates with me.
I see that she thinks I have been so
long lonely and sorrowful that my mind
is not quite right, but she is mistaken—
I am sure she is mistaken. She tells
me that I may involve you in many embarrassments—she
suggests a thousand
difficulties that may occur, but I cannot
consider them now—I cannot go back to
the world—my thoughts are all the
other way.

“She does not oppose me any longer,
but has most solemnly promised to fulfil
my wishes, though she still calls them
strange and singular. She says I am
young—I am young in years, but in the
last twelvemonths I have grown very
old. Oh to the wretched, hours are
years, and weeks are ages!

“She begs me to be governed by her
discretion, but I cannot.

“She knows not—no one knows—
how to look upon the troubled and vanishing
dream of this life, till the light
of another falls upon it. No one knows
how mean every thing that is transient
and perishable appears to me—how insignificant
the joys, nay even the sufferings
that are past, as I stand trembling
on the verge of that bright world of innocence
and safety, where I hope to appear
with the child God has given me.

“My last prayer will be for you, my
child—and for your father—God have
mercy on him!”

Every word of this letter, which may
appear very long and tedious to an indifferent
reader, sunk deep into Ellen's
heart. It seemed to her as if the book
of Providence was unsealed and open
before her, and as the bright light fell on
the path by which she had been led to the
present period of her existence, `Oh my

mother!' she exclaimed, `hast thou not
been with me a guardian spirit to lead
me by the way which was disclosed to
thy prophetic eye?”

Her emotions were deep and indescribable—stronger
than any other were
gratitude to her mother, and admiration
of the courage and single-heartedness
with which she had renounced the world
for her.

“I might,” she thought, “like Caroline,
have been the slave of the world—
the victim of folly: I might have followed
my poor father through the dark and
dreary passages of unbelief, but for that
good part which my sainted mother
chose for me.”

A thousand reflections crowded on her
mind: but gratitude for the past—her
own bright hopes of the future—every
other feeling was soon lost in an extreme
solicitude for her father's recovery.

She knelt by his bed-side—But there
are feelings too sacred to be drawn from

their silent sanctuary—there are services
too hallowed to be described. They are
seen in secret, and rewarded, as Ellen's
were, openly.

We must now recur to Caroline, who,
on re-entering her own room, was startled
by the spectacle of her dressing-case,
the lid open, and pacquet and purse
gone. She seized the dressing-case,
emptied out every article it contained,
in the vain hope that in some corner the
treasure might lurk, but fruitless was
the search, and she dropped it and burst
into tears.

“Oh,” she said, “had the wretch
taken any thing else—my money—my
trinkets—any thing but this—the loss
of this may ruin me.”

While she was thus bewailing her calamity,
she heard a gentle tap at the
door, and on opening it Ellen appeared.
Caroline started back, and said haughtily,
“Has Westall sent you to me,

Miss Bruce?—I could have dispensed
with this favour.”

“No, Miss Redwood,” replied Ellen,
advancing into the room with an air of
dignity and gentleness, “I have come
here on my own errand—Caroline, your”
—here for the first time there was a
slight tremulousness in her voice, and
after a moment's pause, she added, “our
father”—

“You have it then?” shrieked Caroline.

“Yes,” replied Ellen, “I have it—
Providence has restored to me my right;
but you, Caroline have nothing to fear
from me—let the past be for ever forgotten.
Our father, Mr. Westall, and
myself, are all that know where these
precious documents were found: and is
not the secret safe with us? We are the
persons most concerned for your honour
—are we not? Forget the past then,
and regard me without fear or distrust.”

Caroline was touched with Ellen's
generosity, and deeply mortified, for the
moment at least, at the wrong she had
done her.

“I never meant,” she said, as soon as
she could command her voice sufficiently
to put the words together, though
in the most embarrassed and stammering
manner, “I never meant, Ellen, to
keep those papers from you for ever. I
do not believe I should have kept them
so long, but I thought that you could
not suffer from the loss of that which you
were ignorant you possessed; and I
knew that when papa discovered you
were his child, he would care nothing
for me. It was uncertain, you know,
for a long time, which of us Westall preferred,
and though I have since felt a
perfect indifference for him, I did then
wish—at least I should not have disliked
his addresses, and I was sure if
papa knew all, he would throw his influence
into your scale, and then Charles

Westall would have no reason for preferring
me, as, your rights acknowledged,
your fortune would be equal to
mine, and that I could not but think
very unfair, as nearly all papa's fortune
came from my mother, and yours, you
know, was quite pennyless.”

Self-justification is the natural tribute
even in the most hopeless circumstances,
to the law of rectitude written on the
heart. Lame and impotent as was Caroline's
attempt to justify herself, Ellen
replied without appearing to notice any
of its inconsistencies.

“You have not,” she said, “rightly
judged me, Caroline. If you could
have imagined the joy—the gratitude I
have felt this evening, you would not, I
am sure you would not have deferred
my happiness. My mother's name is
vindicated—sanctified my faith has always
held it; but it is now beyond the
reach of suspicion or imputation. You
know not, Caroline, how should you

know! the dreadful solitude of living
without a natural tie to your fellow-creatures.
You know not the exquisite
sensations I have felt this night, even
amidst afflicting fears, beside my father's
bed.”

Ellen's emotion checked her utterance
for a moment: she then added,
“Caroline, it is best that we should understand
one another perfectly. Your
mother's fortune is as entirely yours as if
I had never had an existence. I have
not the right, and certainly, I have not
the wish to interfere with your inheritance
in the smallest degree. All that I
covet, is an equal share of our father's
affections: your confidence I hope to
win; your sisterly affection I will try to
deserve.”

After a short pause, Ellen added in
conclusion, “there is one arrangement,
Caroline, which, if I insist on controlling,
you must not think I too soon assume
the rights of an elder sister. It is my

wish that our relationship should remain
a secret for the present.”

Caroline looked astonished. Ellen,
without seeming to notice her surprise,
proceeded, “in the present state of my
feelings I wish particularly to avoid observation
and remark. The avowal of
my engagement with Mr. Westall, and
your friendship, will give me a right to
share with you the care of our father.
Should he not recover, the secret shall
never be divulged—it is enough that I
know it—for worlds I would not cast a
shadow over his fair name.”

In assigning her motives, Ellen had
avoided any reference to what she knew
must be Caroline's wishes on the subject.
Caroline felt this delicacy to her
heart's core; she was subdued by the
pure goodness of Ellen; she felt the influence
of the holy principle that governed
her sister's mind, and penetrated
with a poignant contrition like that
which made the Egyptian king exclaim,

`truly, I have sinned against the Lord
your God and against you;' she sunk
on her knees—the pride and haughtiness
of her soul were vanquished—she
stretched out her arms with an almost
oriental abjectness. Ellen raised her
and clasped her arms around her. It
may not be too much to say, that the
beautiful sisters were a spectacle at
which heaven might rejoice; for they
seemed to embody penitence and perfect
love.

“Oh, Ellen!” exclaimed Caroline, as
soon as she could speak, “is it possible
that you will not after all triumph over
me? Can you forgive my slights—my
insults? Can you forget the wrong I
have done you?”

“All is forgiven—all forgotten,” replied
Ellen; “think no more of it, Caroline.
Let us now think of nothing but
how we shall best minister to our
father's restoration; for this we will

unite our hearts and efforts. Let us go
together to his room.”

“Yes, I will go—I will do every thing
you ask of me, Ellen,” said Caroline;
“but first tell me, for I never can speak
on the subject again, first tell me where
those papers were found. Did Lilly
give them to you?”

Ellen could not satisfy Caroline's curiosity
to know the particulars of her servant's
unfaithfulness. She could inform
her that the pacquet had been
found in her apartment.

The truth was, that Lilly, during her
northern summer, had formed too intimate
an acquaintance with `the mountain
nymph, sweet liberty,' and had
conceived too strong a friendship for her
to be willing ever again to leave her
dominions.

She had, too, in imitation of her mistress,
been carrying on a snug love
affair of her own with the servant of a

West India planter then at Lebanon.
Miss Redwood's clandestine arrangement
were the signal for the execution
of Lilly's plans, and they afforded an
insurance from the danger of immediate
pursuit—the only security she needed.

Lebanon is a border town, and the
boundary line of New York once passed
and Massachusetts entered, Lilly was
assured of the protecting hospitalities
of the people of her own colour; and
it had even been hinted to her that in
case her retreat was discovered, the
white inhabitants would be very backward
to enforce her master's rights.

Thus encouraged, Lilly availed herself
of the propitious moment of Caroline's
departure, subtracted the purse from the
dressing case, and not wishing to encumber
herself with any superfluity, she left
the dressing-case, and in her haste left
it open, and made good her retreat.

What particular grounds there might

have been in this instance for the intimations
given to Lilly, we cannot say;
but it must be confessed, that our northern
people are quite careless of the
duty of protecting slave property, and
that they manifest a provoking indifference
to the rights and losses of slaveholders.
Indeed, so notorious is their
fault in this particular, that their southern
brethren seldom run the risk of an
irrecoverable loss by exposing their servants
to the danger of an atmosphere
infected with freedom; and those among
them who possess the greatest abundance
of these riches, which emphatically
take to themselves wings and fly away,
prudently make their northern tours attended
by white servants.

The sisters found their way through
the dimly lighted passages to their father's
apartment. Westall met them at
the door; he perceived, at a single
glance, that all was right between them.

“Thank heaven,” said he, “you are
both here; your father has just pronounced
your names.”

“Is he conscious?” whispered Ellen.

“I do not know; but he seems quite
calm and refreshed.”

Caroline and Ellen approached the
bed together. Mr. Redwood looked at
them with an expression of surprise and
inquiry, and a slight convulsion agitated
his face. They both bent over him and
kissed him. He joined their hands,
clasped them in his, and raised his eyes
—peace, gratitude, and devotion, spoke
in them. He said nothing; he seemed
to fear the effort to speak. After a few
moments he relinquished the hands of
his children and closed his eyes. Tears
stole through his eye lids, and a sweet
serenity overspread his countenance.

“This is heaven's own peace,” whispered
Westall; “the world cannot give
it—the world cannot take it away.”