To Col. Bellville.
Tuesday Morning.
YOUR letter, my dear Bellville, gave
me all the consolation it is possible to
receive amidst such a scene of wretchedness
and despair; the tender sympathy of pitying
friendship is the best balm for every
woe.
The delicacy with which you decline
mentioning a subject so improper for the
time, would encrease my esteem for you,
if that was possible. I know the goodness,
the tender sensibility of your heart, too
well, to doubt your approving my resolution
to give six months to the memory of
my angelic friend, and the sad task of endeavoring
to soften the sorrows of her parents.
Her dying voice adjured me not
to leave them to their despair: I will not
forget the sad task her friendship imposed.
The agony of Lady Belmont's grief begins
to give place to a sorrow more reasonable,
though, perhaps, not less exquisite.
The violence of her emotions abates;
she still weeps, but her air is more calm;
she raises her eyes to Heaven, but it is
with a look of patient resignation, which,
whilst it melts my soul to behold, gives
me hopes she will not sink under her afflictions.
Lord Belmont struggles with his
own grief, lest it should encrease hers;
he attempts to comfort her; he begs her,
with an irresolute air, to consider the hand
from whence the stroke proceeded: unable
to go on, his voice trembles; his bosom
swells with unutterable anguish; he rises;
he leaves the room; the tears trickle down
his reverend cheeks.
These, Bellville, these are the scenes I
have perpetually before my eyes.
Colonel Mandeville indulges his sorrow
alone; shut up continually in his apartment,
a prey to silent distress, he seems
to fly from all human converse: if entreated,
he joins our sad party a moment;
he enters with a dejected air, his eyes are
bent earnestly to the ground; he sits motionless,
inattentive, absorbed in reflexion
on his own misery: then, starting up, exclaims,
"All else I could have borne,"
and retires to give himself up to his despair.
I am now convinced Emily Howard deserved
that preference Lady Julia gave her
over me in her heart, of which I once so unjustly
complained; I lament, I regret, but
am enough myself to reason, to reflect;
Emily Howard can only weep.
Far from being consoled for the loss of
her lovely friend, by the prospect of inheriting
Lord Belmont's fortune, to which
after Colonel Mandeville she is intitled, she
seems incapable of tasting any good in life
without her. Every idea of happiness her
gentle mind could form included Lady
Julia's friendship; with her she wished to
spend all her days; she was all to her tender
Emily; without her she finds the world
a desart.
She is changed beyond conception by her
grief, a grief which has not a moment's intermission:
the almost dying paleness of her
cheeks is a witness of the excess of her
affliction; yet this very paleness has a
thousand charms; her distress has something
in it unspeakably lovely; adorned by
sorrow, she puts me in mind of what
Young describes woman in general;
––"So properly the object of affliction,
That Heaven is pleased to make distress
become her,
And dresses her most amiably in tears."
Tuesday Evening.
Bellville, I have been walking in a little
wilderness of flowering shrubs once peculiarly
happy in Lady Julia's favor: there
is a rose which I saw planted by her hand;
it still flourishes in youthful bloom, whilst
she, the fairest flower Heaven ever formed,
lies cropped by the cruel hand of Death.
What force has the imagination over
the senses! How different is the whole face
of nature in my eyes! The once smiling
scene has a melancholy gloom, which strikes
a damp through my inmost soul: I look in
vain for those vivid beauties which once
charmed me; all beauty died with Lady
Julia.
In this spot, where we have so often
walked together, I give way to all the voluptuousness
of sorrow; I recall those happy
days which are never to return; a thousand
tender ideas rush on my memory; I recollect
those dear moments of confidence and
friendship engraved for ever on my heart;
I still hear the sweet accents of that voice,
still behold that matchless form; I see her
every moment before me, in all the playfulness
of youth and innocence; I see her
parents gazing on her as she passes, with that
lively transport a parent only can know.
It was here her rising blushes first discovered
to me the secret of her heart: it was
here the loveliest of mankind first implored
me to favor his passion for my sweet friend.
Pleased with the tender sorrow which
possessed all my soul, I determined to indulge
it to the utmost; and, revolving in
my imagination the happy hours of chearful
friendship to which that smiling scene
had been witness, prolonged my walk till
evening had, almost unperceived, spread its
gloomy horrors round; till the varied tints
of the flowers were lost in the deepening
shades of night.
Awaking at once from the reverie in
which I had been plunged, I found myself
at a distance from the house, just entering
the little wood so loved by my charming
friend; the every moment encreasing darkness
gave an awful gloom to the trees; I
stopped, I looked round, not a human
form was in sight; I listened, and heard not
a sound but the trembling of some poplars
in the wood; I called, but the echo
of my own voice was the only answer I received;
a dreary silence reigned around; a
terror I never felt before seized me; my
heart panted with timid apprehension,
I breathed short, I started at every leaf that
moved; my limbs were covered with a
cold dew; I fancied I saw a thousand airy
forms flit around me; I seemed to hear the
shrieks of the dead and dying: there is no
describing my horrors.
At the moment when my fears had almost
deprived me of sense, I saw Colonel
Mandeville approach; I concealed from
him the terrors of my soul, lest they should
add to the sorrow which consumed him:
he addressed me in a faltering voice, conducted
me to the house almost without
speaking, and leading me into the saloon
––Oh! Bellville! How shall I describe
what I felt on entering the room?
Is not Death of itself sufficiently dreadful,
that we thus clothe it in additional
terrors, by the horrid apparatus with which
we suffer it to be attended? The room was
hung with black, lighted up to show the
affecting objects it contained, and in the
midst, in their coffins, the breathless bodies
of the hapless lovers: on a couch near
them, supported by Emily Howard, the
wretched mother wringing her hands in all
the agony of despair. Lord Belmont
standing by the bodies, looking at them alternately,
weeping over his child, and
raising his desponding eyes to Heaven, beseeching
the God of Mercy to relieve him
from this load of misery, and to put a speedy
period to that life which was now robbed
of all it happiness.
I approach Lady Julia's coffin; I gazed
eagerly on her angel countenance, serene
as that of a sleeping infant; I kissed her
lifeless lips, which still wore the smile of
innocence and peace. Bellville, may my
last end be like hers! May I meet her in
the regions of immortality! Never shall I
forget her gentle virtues, or the delight I
found in her friendship.
She was wrapped in a loose robe of white
satten: her head covered with a veil of
gause: the village maids, who laid her in the
coffin, had adorned her with the freshest flowers;
the stood at an awful distance, weeping
her hard fate and their own: they have
entreated to watch around her this night,
and to bear her to-morrow to the grave.
I had stood some time looking on the
dear remains of Lady Julia, when Colonel
Mandeville took my hand, and leading me
to the coffin in which his son's were deposited;
"Lady Anne, said he, you have forgot
your once favored friend, your once
gay, once lovely Harry Mandeville. Behold
all that death has left of the darling of a
fond parent's heart! The graces of that form
are lost, those lips have ceased to utter the
generous sentiments of the noblest heart
which ever beat; but never will his varied
perfections be blotted from the mind of his
father."
I approached the most lovely of men; the
traces of sorrow were visible on his countenance;
he died in the moment when he heard
the happiness which had been vainly intended
for him. My tears streamed afresh when
I beheld him, when I remembered the sweet
hours we passed together, the gay scenes
which hope had painted to our hearts; I
wept over the friend I had so loved, I pressed
his cold hand to my lips.
Bellville! I am now accustomed to
horrors.
We have prevailed on the wretched parents
to retire: Emily Howard and I have
entreated to watch our angel friends till
midnight, and then leave them to the village
maids, to whom Lady Julia's weeping attendants
insist on being joined.
I dread the rising of to-morrow's sun; he
was meant to light us to happiness.
Thursday Morning.
Bellville! this morning is come: this
morning once so ardently expected: who
shall ever dare to say, To-morrow I will be
happy?
At dawn of day we returned to the saloon;
we bid a last adieu to the loved remains;
my Lord and Colonel Mandeville had been
before us: they were going to close the
coffins, when Lady Belmont burst wildly
into the room; she called eagerly for her
Julia, for the idol of her agonizing soul:
"Let me once more behold my child, let
me once more kiss those icy lips: Oh! Julia!
this day first gave thee birth; this day fond
hope set down for thy bridals; this day we
resign thee to the grave!"
Overcome by the excess of her sorrow,
she fainted into the arms of her woman; we
took that opportunity to convey her from
this scene of terrors: her sense are not yet
returned.
Thursday Evening.
What a day have I passed! may the
idea of it be ever blotted from y
mind!
Nine o'Clock.
The sad procession begins; the whole village
attend in tears; they press to perform
the last melancholy duties; her servants
crowd eagerly round; they weep, they
beat their bosoms, they call on their angelic
mistress, they kiss the pall that covers her
breathless form. Borne by the youngest
of the village maids–Oh! Bellville! never
more shall I behold her! the loveliest of
her sex, the friend on whom my heart
doated–One grave receives the hapless
lovers–
They move on–far other processions–
but who shall resist the hand of Heaven!
Emily Howard comes this way; she has
left the wretched parents: there is a wildness
in her air which chills my blood; she
will behold her friend once more; she proposes
to meet and join the procession: I embraced
the offer with transport–the transport
of enthusiastic sorrow–
We have beheld the closing scene–Bellville,
my heart is breaking–the pride of
the world, the loveliest pair that ever
breathed the vital air, are now cold and inanimate
in the grave.
