 | CHAPTER XXIII. Ormond, or, The secret witness |  |
23. CHAPTER XXIII.
I MUST be forgiven if I now introduce myself
on the stage. Sophia Westwyn is the friend
of Constance, and the writer of this narrative.
So far as my fate was connected with that of my
friend, if is worthy to be known. That connection
has constituted the joy and misery of my
existence, and has prompted me to undertake
this task.
I assume no merit from the desire of knowledge,
and superiority to temptation. There is
little of which I can boast, but that little I derived,
instrumentally, from Constance. Poor as
my attainments are, it is to her that I am indebted
for them all. Life itself was the gift of her
father, but my virtue and felicity are her gifts.
That I am neither indigent nor profligate, flows
from her bounty.
I am not unaware of the divine superintendence,
of the claims upon my gratitude and service,
which pertain to my God. I know that all
physical and moral agents, are merely instrumental
to the purpose that he wills, but though the
great author of being and felicity must not be
forgotten, it is neither possible nor just to overlook
the claims upon our love, with which our
fellow-beings are invested.
The supreme love does not absorb, but chasten
and enforce all subordinate affections. In
proportion to the rectitude of my perceptions and
the ardour of my piety, must I clearly discern
and fervently love, the excellence discovered in
my fellow-beings, and industriously bromote their
improvement and felicity.
From my infancy to my seventeenth year, I
lived in the house of Mr. Dudley. On the day of
my birth, I was deserted by my mother. Her
temper was more akin to that of tygress than
woman: Yet that is unjust, for beasts cherish their
offspring. No natures but human, are capable of
that depravity, which makes insensible to the
claims of innocence and helplessness.
But let me not recall her to memory. Have I
not enough of sorrow? Yet to omit my causes of
disquiet, the unprecedented forlornness of my
condition, and the persecutions of an unnatural
parent, would be to leave my character a problem,
and the sources of my love of Miss Dudley
unexplored. Yet I must not dwell upon that
complication of iniquities, that savage ferocity
and unextinguishable hatred of me, which characterized
my unhappy mother!
I was not safe under the protection of Mr.
Dudley, nor happy in the caresses of his daughter.
My mother asserted the privilege of that
relation; she laboured for years to obtain the controul
of my person and actions; to snatch me
from a peaceful and chaste assylum, and detain
me in her own house, where, indeed, I should
not have been in want of raiment and food, but
where —
O my mother! Let me not dishonor thy name!
Yet it is not in my power to enhance thy infamy.
Thy crimes, unequalled as they were, were, perhaps,
expiated by thy penitence. Thy offences
are too well known, but perhaps they who witnessed
thy freaks of intoxication, thy defiance of
public shame, the enormity of thy pollutions, the
infatuation that made thee glory in the pursuit of
a loathesome and detestable trade, may be strangers
to the remorse and the abstinence which accompanied
the close of thy ignominious life.
For ten years was my peace incessantly molested,
by the menaces or machinations of my mother.
The longer she meditated my destruction,
the more tenacious of her purpose, and indefatigable
in her efforts, she became. That my mind
was harrassed with perpetual alarms, was not
enough. The fame and tranquility of Mr. Dudley
and his daughter, were hourly assailed. My
mother resigned herself to the impulses of malignity
and rage. Headlong passions and a vigorous,
though perverted understanding, were her's.
Hence her stratagems to undermine the reputation
of my protector, and to bereave him of domestic
comfort, were subtle and profound. Had
she not herself been careless of that good, which
she endeavoured to wrest from others, her artifices
could scarcely have been frustrated.
In proportion to the hazard which accrued to
my protector and friend, the more ardent their
zeal in my defence, and their affection for my
person became. They watched over me with ineffable
solicitude. At all hours and in every occupation,
I was the companion of Constance.
All my wants were supplied, in the same proportion
as her's. The tenderness of Mr. Dudley
seemed equally divided between us. I partook
of his instructions, and the means of every intellectual
and personal gratification, were lavished
upon me.
The speed of my mother's career in infamy,
was at length slackened. She left New-York,
which had long been the theatre of her vices.
Actuated by a new caprice, she determined to
travel through the Southern States. Early indulgence
was the cause of her ruin, but her parents
had given her the embellishments of a fashionable
education. She delighted to assume all parts,
and personate the most opposite characters. She
of virtue, into scenes hitherto unvisited.
She journeyed as far as Charleston. Here she
met an inexperienced youth, lately arrived from
England, and in possession of an ample fortune.
Her speciousness and artifices seduced him into a
precipitate marriage. Her true character, however,
could not be long concealed by herself,
and her vices had been too conspicuous, for her
long to escape recognition. Her husband was
infatuated by her blandishments. To abandon
her, or to contemplate her depavity with unconcern,
were equally beyond his power. Romantic
in his sentiments, his fortitude was unequal to
his disappointments, and he speedily sunk into
the grave. By a similar refinement in generosity,
he bequeathed to her his property.
With this accession of wealth, she returned to
her ancient abode. The mask, lately worn,
seemed preparing to be thrown aside, and her
profligate habits to be resumed with more eagerness
than ever, but an unexpected and total
revolution was effected, by the exhortations of a
Methodist divine. Her heart seemed, on a sudden,
to be remoulded, her vices and the abettors
of them were abjured, she shut out the intrusions
of society, and prepared to expiate, by the rigours
of abstinence and the bitterness of tears,
the offences of her past life.
In this, as in her former career, she was unacquainted
with restraint and moderation. Her
remorses gained strength, in proportion as she
cherished them. She brooded over the images of
her guilt, till the possibility of forgiveness and
remission disappeared. Her treatment of her
daughter and her hasband constituted the chief
source of her torment. Her awakened conscience
persecutions. Her thought became, by rapid
degrees, tempestuous and gloomy, and it was at
length evident, that her condition was maniacal.
In this state, she was to me an object, no longer
of terror, but compassion. She was surrounded
by hirelings, devoid of personal attachment,
and anxious only to convert her misfortunes,
to their own advantage. This evil it was
my duty to obviate. My presence for a time, only
enhanced the vehemence of her malady, but
at length it was only by my attendance and soothing,
that she was diverted from the fellest purposes.
Shocking execrations and outrages, resolutions
and efforts to destroy herself and those
around her, were sure to take place in my absence.
The moment I appeared before her, her
fury abated; her gesticulations were becalmed,
and her voice exerted only in incoherent and pathetic
lamentations.
These scenes, though so different from those
which I had formerly been condemned to witness,
were scarcely less excruciating. The friendship
of Constantia Dudley was my only consolation.
She took up her abode with me, and shared with
me every disgustful and perilous office, which my
mother's insanity prescribed.
Of this consolation, however, it was my fate
to be bereaved. My mother's state was deplorable,
and no remedy hitherto employed, was efficacious.
A voyage to England, was conceived
likely to benefit, by change of temperature and
scenes, and by the opportunity it would afford of
trying the superior skill of English phyicians.
This scheme, after various struggles, on my part,
was adopted. It was detestable to my imagination,
because it severed me from that friend, in
whose participation, knowledge lost its attractions,
and society became a torment.
The prescriptions of my duty could not be disguised
or disobeyed, and we parted. A mutual
engagement was formed, to record every sentiment
and relate every event that happened, in
the life of either, and no opportunity of communicating
information, was to be omitted. This
engagement was punctually performed on my
part. I sought out every method of conveyance
to my friend, and took infinite pains to procure
tidings from her, but all were ineffectual.
My mother's malady declined, but was succeeded
by a pulmonary disease, which threatened
her speedy destruction. By the restoration of
her understanding, the purpose of her voyage
was obtained, and my impatience to return, which
the inexplicable and ominous silence of my friend
daily increased, prompted me to exert all my
powers of persuasion, to induce her to re-visit
America.
My mother's frenzy was a salutary crisis in her
moral history. She looked back upon her past
conduct with unspeakable loathing, but this retrospect
only invigorated her devotion and her
virtue: but the thought of returning to the scene
of her unhappiness and infamy, could not be endured.
Besides, life in her eyes, possessed considerable
attractions, and her physicians flattered
her with recovery from her present disease, if she
would change the atmosphere of England for that
of Languedoc and Naples.
I followed her with murmurs and reluctance.
To desert her in her present critical state would
have been inhuman. My mother's aversions and
attachments, habits and views were dissonant
with my own. Conformity of sentiments and
to bind us to each other. My attendance was assiduous,
but it was the sense of duty that rendered
my attendance a supportable task.
Her decay was eminently gradual. No time
seemed to diminish her appetite for novelty and
change. During three years we traversed every
part of France, Switzerland and Italy. I could
not but attend to surrounding scenes, and mark
the progress of the mighty revolution, whose effects,
like agitation in a fluid, gradually spread
from Paris, the centre, over the face of the neighbouring
kingdoms; but there passed not a day or
an hour in which the image of Constance was not
recalled, in which the most pungent regrets were
not felt at the inexplicable silence which had been
observed by her, and the most vehement longings
indulged to return to my native country.
My exertions to ascertain her condition by indirect
means, by interrogating natives of America,
with whom I chanced to meet, were unwearied,
but, for a long period, ineffectual.
During this pilgrimage, Rome was thrice visited.
My mother's indisposition was hastening to
a crisis, and she formed the resolution of closing
her life at the bottom of Vesuvius. We stopped,
for the sake of a few day's repose, at Rome. On
the morning after our arrival, I accompanied some
friends to view the public edifices. Casting my
eyes over the vast and ruinous interior of the Coliseo,
my attention was fixed by the figure of a
young man, whom, after a moment's pause, I recollected
to have seen in the streets of New-York.
At a distance from home, mere community of
country is no inconsiderable bond of affection.
The social spirit prompts us to cling even to inanimate
objects, when they remind us of ancient
fellowships and juvenile attachments.
A servant was dispatched to summon this stranger,
who recognized a country-woman with a
pleasure equal to that which I had received. On
nearer view, this person, whose name was Courtland,
did not belie my favorable prepossessions.
Our intercourse was soon established on a footing
of confidence and intimacy.
The destiny of Constance was always uppermost
in my thoughts. This person's acquaintance
was originally sought, chiefly in the hope of obtaining
from him some information respecting my
friend. On inquiry I discovered that he had left
his native city, seven months after me. Having
tasked his recollection and compared a number of
facts, the name of Dudley at length re-occurred
to him. He had casually heard the history of
Craig's imposture and its consequences. These
were now related as ciscumstantially as a memory,
occupied by subsequent incidents, enabled
him. The tale had been told to him, in a domestic
circle which he was accustomed to frequent,
by the person who purchased Mr. Dudley's
lute, and restored it to its previous owner,
on the conditions formerly mentioned.
This tale filled me with anguish and doubt.
My impatience to search out this unfortunate girl,
and share with her her sorrows or relieve them,
was anew excited by this mournful intelligence.
That Constantia Dudley was reduced to beggary,
was too abhorrent to my feelings to recieve credit,
yet the sale of her father's property, comprising
even his furniture and cloathing, seemed to
prove that she had fallen even to this depth.
This enabled me in some degree to account for
her silence. Her generous spirit would induce
her to conceal misfortunes from her friend, which
no communication would alleviate. It was possible
that she had selected some new abode, and
and which amounted to volumes, had never reached
her hands.
My mother's state would not suffer me to obey
the impulse of my heart. Her frame was verging
towards dissolution. Courtland's engagements
allowed him to accompany us to Naples,
and here the long series of my mother's pilgrimages,
closed in death. Her obsequies were no
sooner performed, than I determined to set out
on my long projected voyage. My mother's property,
which, in consequence of her decease, devolved
upon me, was not inconsiderable. There
is scarcely any good so dear, to a rational being,
as competence. I was not unacquainted with
its benefits, but this acquisition was valuable to
me chiefly as it enabled me to re-unite my fate to
that of Constance.
Courtland was my countryman and friend. He
was destiiute of fortune, and had been led to Europe
partly by the spirit of adventure, and partly
on a mereabtile project. He had made sale of
his property, on advantageous terms, in the ports
of France, and resolved to consume the produce
in examining this scene of heroic exploits and memorable
revolutions. His slender stock, though
frugally and even parsimoniously administered,
was nearly exhausted, and at the time of our
meeting at Rome, he was making reluctant preparations
to return.
Sufficient opportunity was afforded us, in an
unrestrained and domestic intercourse of three
months, which succeeded our Roman interview,
to gain a knowledge of each other. There was
that conformity of tastes and views between us,
which could scarcely fail, at an age, and in a situation
like ours, to give birth to tenderness.
My resolution to hasten to America, was peculiarly
to be my companion, but this offer, my regard to
his interest obliged me to decline; but I was willing
to compensate him for this denial, as well as
to gratify my own heart, by an immediate marriage.
So long a residence in England and Italy, had
given birth to friendships and connections of the
dearest kind. I had no view but to spend my life
with Courtland, in the midst of my maternal
kindred who were English. A voyage to America,
and re-union with Constance were previously
indispensable, but I hoped that my friend
might be prevailed upon, and that her disconnected
situation would permit her, to return with
me to Europe. If this end could not be accomplished,
it was my inflexible purpose to live and
to die with her. Suitably to this arrangement,
Courtland was to repair to London, and wait patiently
till I should be able to rejoin him there, or
to summon him to meet me in America.
A week after my mother's death, I became a
wife, and embarked, the next day, at Naples, in
a Ragusan ship, destined for New-York. The
voyage was tempestuous and tedious. The vessel
was necessitated to make a short stay at Toulon.
The state of that city, however, then in
possession of the English, and besieged by the
revolutionary forces, was adverse to commercial
views. Happily, we resumed our voyage, on
the day previous to that on which the place was
evacuated by the British. Our seasonable departure
rescued us from witnessing a scene of
horrors, of which the history of former wars, furnish
us with few examples.
A cold and boisterous navigation awaited us.
My palpitations and inquietudes augmented as
we approached the American coast. I shall not
sight of the Beacon at Sandy-Hook. It was first
seen at midnight, in a stormy and beclouded atmosphere,
emerging from the waves, whose fluctuation
allowed it, for some time, to be visible
only by fits. This token of approaching land, affected
me as much as if I had reached the threshhold
of my friend's dwelling.
At length we entered the port, and I viewed,
with high-raised, but inexplicable feelings, objects
with which I had been from infancy familiar.
The flag-staff erected on the battery, recalled to
my imagination the pleasures of the evening and
morning walks, which I had taken on that spot,
with the lost Constantia. The dream was fondly
cherished, that the figure which I saw, loitering
along the terrace, was her's.
On disembarking, I gazed at every female passenger,
in hope that it was she whom I sought.
An absence of three years, had obliterated from
my memory none of the images which attended
me on my departure.
| CHAPTER XXIII. Ormond, or, The secret witness | |