University of Virginia Library

20. CHAP. XX.

Barry Cornwall.

Grace, agitated by these events, and her slight form
daily becoming more shadowy, seemed like a celestial
spirit, which having performed its mission on earth, melts
into a misty wreath, then disappears forever.

Hers had always been the kind of beauty that is eloquence,
though it speaks not. The love she inspired,
was like that we feel for some fair infant which we would
fain clasp to our hearts in its guileless beauty; and when
it repays our fondness with a cherub smile, its angelic
influence rouses all there is of heaven within the soul.
Deep compassion was now added to these emotions;
and wherever she moved, the eye of pity greeted her,
as it would some wounded bird, nestling to the heart in
its timid loveliness.

Every one who knew her, felt the influence of her
exceeding purity and deep pathos of character; but
very few had penetrated into its recesses, and discovered
its hidden treasures. Melody was there, but it was too
plaintive, too delicate in its combination, to be produced

by an unskilful hand. The coarsest minds felt its witching
effect, though they could not define its origin;—like
the servant, mentioned by Addison, who drew the bow
across every string of her master's violin, and then complained
that she could not, for her life, find where the
tune was secreted.

Souls of this fine mould keep the fountain of love
sealed deep within its caverns; and to one only is access
ever granted. Miss Osborne's affection had been
tranquil on the surface,—but it was as deep as it was
pure. It was a pool which had granted its healing influence
to one, but could never repeat the miracle,
though an angel should trouble its waters.

Assuredly, he that could mix death in the cup of love,
which he offered to one so young, so fair, and so true,—
was guilty as the priest who administered poison in the
holy eucharist.

Lucretia, now an inmate of the family, read to her,
supported her across the chamber, and watched her
brief, gentle slumbers, with an intense interest, painfully
tinged with self-reproach. She was the cause of this
premature decay,—innocent indeed, but still the cause.
Under such circumstances, the conscience is morbid in
its sensibility,—unreasonable in its acuteness; and
the smiles and forgiveness of those we have injured, tear
and scorch it like burning pincers.

Yet there was one, who suffered even more than Lucretia,—though
he was never conscious of giving one
moment's pain to the object of his earliest affection.
During the winter, every leisure moment which Doctor

Willard's numerous avocations allowed him, was spent
in Miss Osborne's sick chamber; and every tone,—every
look of his, went to her heart with a thrilling expression,
that seemed to say, “Would I could die for
thee. Oh, would to God I could die for thee.”

Thus pillowed on the arm of friendship, and watched
over by the eye of love, Grace languidly awaited the
returning spring; and when May did arrive, wasted as
she was, she seemed to enjoy its pure breath and sunny
smile. Alas, that the month which dances around the
flowery earth, with such mirthful step and beaming
glance, should call so many victims of consumption to
their last home.

Towards the close of this delightful season, the invalid,
bolstered in her chair, and surrounded by her affectionate
family, was seated at the window, watching the
declining sun. There was deep silence for a long while;
—as if her friends feared that a breath might scare the
flitting soul from its earthly habitation. Henry and Lucretia
sat on either side, pressing her hands in mournful
tenderness; Doctor Willard leaned over her chair, and
looked up to the unclouded sky, as if he reproached it
for mocking him with brightness; and her father watched
the hectic flush upon her cheek, with the firmness of
Abraham, when he offered his only son upon the altar.
Oh, how would the heart of that aged sufferer have rejoiced
within him, could he too have exchanged the
victim!

She had asked Lucretia to place Somerville's rose on
the window beside her. One solitary blossom was on

it; and she reached forth her weak hand to pluck it;
but its leaves scattered beneath her trembling touch.
She looked up to Lucretia, with an expression which
her friend could never forget,—and one cold tear slowly
glided down her pallid cheek. Gently as a mother
kisses her sleeping babe, Doctor Willard brushed it
away; and turning hastily, to conceal his quivering lip,
he clasped Henry's hand with convulsive energy, as he
whispered, “Oh, God of mercies, how willingly would
I have wiped all tears from her eyes.”

There is something peculiarly impressive in manly
grief. The eye of woman overflows as readily as her
heart; but when waters gush from the rock, we feel
that they are extorted by no gentle blow.

The invalid looked at him with affectionate regret, as
if she thought it a crime not to love such enduring kindness;
and every one present made a powerful effort to
suppress painful, suffocating emotion.

Lucretia had a bunch of purple violets fastened in
her girdle,—and with a forced smile, she placed them
in the hands of her dying friend.

She looked at them a moment with a sort of abstracted
attention, and an expression strangely unearthly, as
she said, “I have thought that wild flowers might be
the alphabet of angels,—whereby they write on hills
and fields mysterious truths, which it is not given our
fallen nature to understand. What think you, dear father?”

“I think, my beloved child, that the truths we do
comprehend, are enough to support us through all our
trials.”

The confidence of the christian was strong within
him, when he spoke; but he looked on his dying daughter,
the only image of a wife dearly beloved,—and
nature prevailed. He covered his eyes and shook
his white hairs mournfully, as he added, “God in his
mercy grant that we may find them sufficient in this
dreadful struggle.”

All was again still,—still, in that chamber of death.
The birds sung as sweetly as if there was no such thing
as discord in the habitations of man; and the blue sky
was as bright as if earth were a stranger to ruin, and
the human soul knew not of desolation. Twilight advanced,
unmindful that weeping eyes watched her majestic
and varied beauty. The silvery clouds that composed
her train, were fast sinking into a gorgeous column
of gold and purple. It seemed as if celestial spirits
were hovering round their mighty pavilion of light,
and pressing the verge of the horizon with their glittering
sandals.

Amid the rich, variegated heaps of vapour, was one
spot of clear, bright cerulean. The deeply coloured
and heavy masses which surrounded it, gave it the effect
of distance,—so that it seemed like a portion of
the inner heaven. Grace fixed her earnest gaze upon
it, as the weary traveller does upon an Oasis in the desert.
That awful lustre which the soul beams forth at
its parting, was in her eye, as she said, “I could almost
fancy there are happy faces looking down to welcome
me.”

“It is very beautiful,” said Lucretia, in a subdued
tone. “It is such a sky as you used to love to look
upon, dear Grace.”

“It is such a one as we loved,” she answered.
“There was a time when it would have made me very
happy; but—my thoughts are now beyond it.”

Her voice grew faint, and there was a quick gasp,—
as if the rush of memory was too powerful for her weak
frame.

Doctor Willard hastily prepared a cordial, and offered
it to her lips. Those lips were white and motionless;
her long, fair eye-lashes drooped, but trembled not.—
He placed his hand on her side;—the heart that had
loved so well, and endured so much, had throbbed its
last.

With a countenance as pale as the lifeless being beside
him, Doctor Willard whispered, “Your daughter
is dead!”

One deep, piercing groan burst from the bosom of
the bereaved father,—and it was echoed by a faint
shriek, as they all involuntarily knelt beside the corpse.

For many minutes, no sound was uttered by any one.
The quick, convulsive motion of the foot, and the handkerchief,
which rose and fell on the throbbing temples,
alone betrayed the grief that was storming within their
souls.

At length Mr. Osborne arose, and observed that it
was necessary they should leave the room.

Father, brother, and lover kissed that pale brow as
they passed. “Thus,—thus—dear, loved one, must

we part,” said Doctor Willard; and he rushed out of
the house with the swiftness of one goaded on by the
sting of anguish.

It was years before he could hear Grace talked of
with composure. His footsteps were deeply marked
around her grave; and not even the terrible scenes in
which his ardent soul was afterward actively engaged,
could drive her from his memory. A miniature was
copied from her portrait,—and when the body of the
young patriot was afterward buried on the field of battle,
this valued relic was found encrusted in his heart's
blood.

In the ebony desk of the deceased, was discovered
“The Rape of the Lock,” which had been the gift of
her faithless lover, during their earliest acquaintance;
the ring, which had broken at their parting; and a letter
to be delivered to him after her death. It was as
follows:

We will not attempt to portray the sorrow that pervaded
Mr. Osborne's desolate home. The painter, called
upon to represent a father's grief, despaired of success,
and wisely shrouded the convulsed features in a
mantle.

Honest Dudley and his wife were the only ones who
were loud and boisterous in their lamentations; but the
peculiar circumstances of Miss Osborne's death excited
universal interest; and the sternest nerves quivered
when the lifeless remains of so much loveliness were
lowered in the ground. The event no doubt produced
much greater sensation on account of political fermentation.
She whom they followed to the grave, was the
only daughter of a man that had ever firmly vindicated
the rights of America; and she had been cut down, in
the full bloom of youth and beauty, by the cruelty of a
haughty foreigner,—a pampered connexion of Hutchinson,—an
insolent military oppressor. Some urged
Mr. Osborne to seek redress for his wrongs; others talked
loudly of revenge; but the soul of the old man was
sick within him, and he would turn away from them
with loathing, and in the privacy of his own closet he

would pour forth his sorrows to the God who heareth
prayer.

Governor Hutchinson had great kindness of feeling,
though it had been too much chilled by ambition and
avarice. This sad catastrophe was sudden to him; and
it affected him deeply. Madam Sandford, too, forgot
all her disappointed schemes in unfeigned contrition for
the prejudices she had indulged. The result of all this,
was a long letter from Governor Hutchinson, thanking
Lucretia for various munificent presents, conjuring her
to return to them, and begging forgiveness for the hasty
resentment which had separated them from one they
loved so much.

When Miss Fitzherbert showed this epistle to Mr.
Osborne, he drew her affectionately to his bosom, and
said, “You shall do just as your heart dictates, my dear
child. Yet for her sake, you are dear to me as a daughter;
and who shall bathe the old man's throbbing head,
or smooth his pillow, when you are away? Above all,
who shall talk to me of her that is gone, and give relief
to the troubled soul by sharing all its griefs?”

“You still have Henry left, my dear sir,” replied
Lucretia, with a tearful smile.

“True; and the blessing of heaven will rest on that
dutiful son and affectionate brother; but the voice of
woman sooths the mourner, and the cordial is more
healing when prepared by her hand. Nevertheless, as
you will, dear friend of my beloved daughter. Wherever
you are, my affection and my blessing will rest upon
you.”

Lucretia kissed away a tear before it had time to fall,
and immediately answered the benefactors of her youth,
by saying, that her love and gratitude had never abated,
—that she should think much of them, and visit them
often, but that her heart was weary of splendour,—that
she loved the quiet home of Mr. Osborne, and thought
it her duty to remain with him during the remainder of
his pilgrimage.

About three weeks after Grace's farewell letter was
despatched to Somerville's supposed residence, a young
man, wild and hurried in his manner, called upon the
sexton, and requested the key of Mr. Osborne's tomb.
With weak, irregular steps, he entered that house of
death, and raised the lid of the coffin last placed there.
Convulsed and shuddering, he started back! The imagination
shrinks from mortal decay,—yet it conveys a
moral which beauty should remember.

The stranger dared not trust himself with another look.
He leaned on the coffin, for a few minutes, as if utterly
unconscious of existence. Not a sigh, not a tear, relieved
the bursting anguish of his heart. His eye accidentally
rested on the inscription:

“Grace Osborne; aged 19. Departed this life May
27th, 1769.”

He sprung forward, as if an adder stung him,—and
throwing himself on the ground, clasped the sod to his
forehead, as if to cool its burning agony. It was here
that the sexton found him, and after a tedious effort, he
persuaded him to lean on his arm, and suffer himself to
be led to a neighbouring hotel. The next day he was

gone. He had sought acquaintance with no one, and
no one knew his name; but he was always supposed to
be Frederic Somerville Fitzherbert.

Four weeks after this mysterious visit, the Baltimore
paper announced that a young man had died at the
King's Head tavern, in a high fever, and very delirious.
A postscript added, that letters were found among his
papers, some directed to Captain Frederic Somerville,
and others to Colonel Frederic S. Fitzherbert.

Governor Hutchinson immediately repaired thither.
The nephew of whom he had once been so proud, had
indeed fallen a victim to his own fluctuating principles
and misguided feelings.

A will was found, in which his small property, consisting
of about two thousand pounds, was left to Henry
Osborne. In this document was inclosed the following
fragment:

“Much injured Friend,

“Your sweet sister is dead! Well, I shall not long
survive her. No matter what I think of;—I have horrible
thoughts sometimes: but I shall not long survive
her. What money I have, I will leave to you. It is
the only atonement that I can now make for all my errors—all
my cruelty. I have plunged into dissipation;
but the glance of beauty has made me writhe in agony.
I have looked on where others were happy; but at my
approach, every bud of joy withered. I am the branded
outcast of heaven. Every eye glances at me in hatred.
I know not what I write. Sense, memory, every
thing, lies buried in that cold, distant grave. I wish I

could pray,—but my stubborn knee will not bend, and
my proud heart rises in defiance of Almighty power.
From His eye I cannot flee,—and it frowns upon me in
tremendous wrath. I carry my hell within me.”

Here this wild epistle broke suddenly off. Miss Osborne's
letter was found among his papers; but whether
he had received it before this was written,—and whether
it soothed or maddened him, seemed wholly uncertain.
Those whom he had so deeply injured, wept when
they heard of his death. If he had sinned, he had
likewise suffered; and the grave covers all.

Among his papers was a journal, which in many places
betrayed a willingness to return to the object of his
first affection, and a thorough conviction that it would
be entirely useless.

In one place he mentioned Lucretia,—said she had
treated him as he deserved,—that he had ceased to
breathe her name with curses, and that his respect and
kind wishes would ever follow her.

It is not in the nature of man to stand at the grave
even of an enemy, and hate the handful of dust that
lies beneath him; and, oh, how bitterly do we remember
any pain we may have given those we once loved,
whatever was the provocation.

All the wrongs Lucretia had endured, were forgotten.
She only remembered her youthful lover, splendid in
his talents,—ardent and generous in his feelings.

“Were he but alive,” thought she, “I could welcome
even insult from his lips,—nay, kneel to thank him
for one look,—though that look were hatred.”