insatiable avidity for the earliest display of the ever-varying changes in dress, which caprice and vanity suggested. Night after night the poor girl retired to bed worn-out in body and depressed in mind. It was seldom that she procured in the arms of "Nature's soft nurse," a temporary relief from the gnawing solicitudes which now overpowered her : and if, occasionally, worn-out strength could no longer sustain the obstinate vigilance of thought, her sleep was that of anxious and agitated slumber. In the silence and solitude of the night, fancy painted the comforts of the domestic circle which she had left at home; the rational and instructive society of her parents and her brothers and sisters; the refreshing breezes of dewy morning, ushered in with the carol of the feathered songsters in every copse, adding to the peaceful and grateful, yet joyous feeling which these created when she took her morning walks round the little garden of the manse: and depicted them in such lively colours, contrasted powerfully with her present state, that her heart sickened. It was not wonderful under such circumstances, her hopes disappointed and her health undermined, that she sunk into a state of settled despondency. Miss The change in Miss was not altogether unperceived by Mrs. ; but the pressure of her employment forbade her to look narrowly into the health of her young assistants. herself felt the inroad which disease was making upon her frame; the act of awakening in the morning was no longer one of refreshment or enjoyment; the dawn was hailed as an unwelcome intruder; and the close of evening as only the prelude to a retrospective train of the most wretched nocturnal meditations. Still, even in the epistolary communications with her family, she breathed no complaint of the feeling of solitude which hung over her and depressed all her energies; she spoke not of the intense longing for the domestic society which she had left behind; nor uttered a complaint of the little sympathy which she received from the only person upon whom she had any claim for attention. It has been well said, that "there is an antiseptic power in an active benevolence which counteracts the putrescency of melancholy, and has, in some instances, proved an antidote even to the gangrene of despair :"* but this, also, was denied to Charlotte. The only person in the establishment in whom she had found any reciprocity of sentiment, was a young lady of her own age, the daughter of a deceased officer: but she had suffered from the confinement and sedentary nature of the occupation, and had been removed on account of ill health thence, when she walked out on a Sunday, the only day in which she was permitted to breathe the fresh air, she knew not a single being upon whom she could exercise a kindly feeling. Such a condition of mental and bodily suffering could not long be sustained with impunity by her delicate frame. The rose, already faded from her cheek, had been succeeded by a varying hectic flush, recurring especially in the evening: her countenance had acquired a pallid, sallow hue; her features were shrunk; a cough succeeded, and soon augmented in force and frequency, whilst her breathing was short and hurried on the slightest exertion. These were the harbingers of Consump * Reid's "Essays on Insanity," p. 60. was demanded. tion; and its rapid advancement could not escape the most careless observer. The change, indeed, was so conspicuous that it alarmed Mrs. and the assistance of the medical attendant of the family Mr., from whom I learned the foregoing particulars, was not only a sensible man and an excellent medical practitioner, but he was ever acutely alive to the distress and the sufferings of others He instantly saw the alarming condition of his patient, and advised that her relations should be apprized of her danger. I was called in two days afterwards, and saw Miss — in bed. Her form was already much attenuated; the pulse was small and quick; the breathing rapid, with frequent cough and copious expectoration, and the voice was feeble and husky. The stethoscope* indicated the existence of a large cavernous ulcer in the left lung: but besides these symptoms, the powers of life were almost exhausted to the utmost by hectic and morning perspirations. There could be only one opinion of the extent of the danger, which was most imminent; and the anxious expression of Miss 's countenance evidently displayed that she had a correct opinion of her own condition. Before I took my leave, she earnestly implored me to inform her whether I thought she could survive until her father arrived? Mrs. was startled with the opinion which I delivered to her: and inquired, "Whether Miss "Whether Miss could not be removed from the house? It would be most uncomfortable were the poor thing to die in the house-she always thought her too delicate for the business.What could she do?" I was about to reply to these selfish remarks, when a thundering knock at the street-door announced the arrival of some important customer, which instantly called her away, and I left the house. Truly, indeed, is this variety of Consumption designated "galloping." Every bad symptom rapidly increased; and, before my third visit, the disease was advancing to its fatal close. On entering the sick room on that occasion, I found an elderly gentleman seated by the bedside, and holding the hand of my poor patient in his. Miss made an effort to half-raise herself in bed; and with a smile said, "Doctor, my dear father!" This effort seemed to overpower her, and she sunk back upon the pillow. The gentleman to whom she had just introduced me, appeared to be above fifty years of age; his face was care-worn, but its expression mild, amiable, and highly intellectual. His person was tall and spare: and, although he was dressed in a rather threadbare suit of black, with his grey hair plainly combed back from his forehead, and falling down behind nearly to his shoulders, which gave a primitive or covenanter-like aspect to him, yet there was a selfpossession and courteous manner in his deportment, which bespoke the real gentleman. He rose, and bowing, offered me his chair for the facility of examining my patient. The placid smile with which Miss had introduced the old gentleman to me, still beamed upon her face: but, on regarding her, I * An instrument which is calculated to convey sounds; and to indicate, from the nature of those within the chest, the extent of disease existing in the lungs. was struck with the fixed and motionless appearance of her features and her eyes; and the absence of all respiratory movement. On placing my finger upon her wrist, I found no pulse, the heart had ceased to beat, the tide of life had receded, never to flow again. I gazed for a moment upon her: I could scarcely believe my senses: although it was that form of departure which I had more than once witnessed, in Consumption, 66 Smiling, as some fly had tickled slumber; The truth, however, was too evident; the arch enemy had achieved his triumph, and her pure spirit regained its celestial source. The worthy parson, whose eye was alternately turned upon the face of his child and upon my countenance, was soon awakened to the melancholy fact. For a moment the blood left his lips, and he staggered as if he was about to faint; but he quickly regained his self-possession, and said, in a stifled voice," "Tis the will of God! I submit." The feelings of the parent, however, soon rose above those of the Christian divine; and giving vent to one convulsive sob, he knelt down by the bed and buried his face in his hands. It would have been a mockery to the heart-broken mourner to have uttered a single word of consolation; and, therefore, having given a few directions to the nurse, and taken one last look of the afflicting scene, I quitted the room. Five days afterwards, Mr. called at my house to thank me for what he was pleased to call my kind attention to his departed darling. "It was a sad blow," he said; "but it was his duty to be resigned. He knew his dear daughter was happy-her untainted spirit had found rest in the bosom of her Maker. He felt that, if any consolation could reach the heart of her mother, it would be the fact that he had arrived in time to receive the parting breath of his afflicted child upon his lips: and now" He paused and struggled to control his sensibility: memory had evidently awakened a crowd of painful reminiscences, beneath which his soul laboured, and his feelings were too big for utterance. I returned in silence my recognition of the warm and grateful pressure of his hand; for my own heart was too full for speech, and we parted never to meet again. The figure of the venerable pastor and his dead daughter are at this moment present in my mind's eye. Would to Heaven, her fate were a solitary instance of the sacrifice of youth and innocence to the inconsiderate selfishness of vanity and the tyranny of fashion !† May 14, 1840. (To be continued.) A. T. T. Shakspeare. + The Author thinks it necessary to state that this lamentable tale is not a fiction. A WEST-COUNTRY CRUSADE. BY GEORGE RAYMOND, Esq. "Vitæ me redde priori." 6 "ON the 20th of September last," writes Sir William Heartfree, "I had entered my sixtieth year-an epoch most admonitory in the era of humanity, beyond which, in the round game of his planetary career, man is supposed to beg a grace' for continuing his play, holding no longer a' life' on more flattering terms. An event, to the solemnity of which no one could be unmoved:-but a further incident was appertaining in my individual case, which rendered the period of still more imperative record. On the day preceding, I had commenced a journey, lying through a certain division of Cornwall, and concluded my first portion (for I travelled on horseback) at an agreeable village, where I resolved to put up for the night. The housewifery was certainly of the thrifty kind-homely, but by no means devoid of comfort; and my groom having given me assurance of the excellence of the stables (a question which his more inquisitive trial of the tap had induced him generously to take for granted), I was altogether at ease. Landladies of country inns, time out of mind, seem by prescription to have appropriated certain physical phenomena, as much the sign of their calling as that swinging over their doorway. The present, was fat, almost beyond the exertion of admeasurement, and that circumference which nature, or rather herself, had designed for a waist, was articulated by an equatorial line, nearly lost in the voluminous matter which collapsed over it. Her little grey eyes and low forehead were set within the moulding of a rouleau of yellow hair, and her distended lips in nowise screened certain jagged teeth, a dismantled portcullis to the avenue of her throat. As to her nose, having heard talk,' I apprehend, of a most unequivocal revenge upon the face, she had doubtlessly cut it off; or peradventure having followed it' for a good many years, she could no longer keep up with an object so much nimbler than herself, and so had given up the pursuit. Her gown, verily no mean primer in natural history, being impressed with all the birds of the air and fishes in the sea, was turned up in a bunch behind, but far from resembling the beautiful parabola of a modern bustle;' while the altitude of her heels, being nearly 45°, gave her much the semblance of being tilted on a pair of dice-boxes. The parlour walls of the said inn, like a hundred others between Berwick and the British Channel, were graphically distinguished by the representatives of Faith, Hope, and Charity-three as thinly-clad personages, for ladies of virtue, as it had ever been my fortune to encounter. A sampler over the fireplace bore record of an alphabet from the characters of Sanchoniatho to our own pica, terminating by Mary Ann Glasscock-her work-A.D. 1802. A paper lantern fantastically cut into a representation of the temple of Solomon, was suspended from the ceiling, and a small oval looking-glass was fixed against the wall, at such an elevation that vanity must have perched itself on a ladder, for the smallest piece of self-satis faction. 6 "The obscurest inn is not without some old magazine, or road-book, or Muggletonian tract at least. On making application for something in the shape of the former, the Delicate Investigator for 1783, was brought to me. Turning over the leaves, I fell in with the portrait of Lord Foiblesse; on the other side, a representation of a lady in the act of stepping into a post-chariot, attended by the identical lord, now cocked-hatted and booted; but having little curiosity for collecting evidence on what might transpire, I rang for my chamber-light and went to bed. I here soon fell asleep; and now within the camera oscura of my brain, distant and departed things were magically thrown on the table of my memory. Scenes which time and the barbarian' had nearly defaced, or the accumulated incidents of a long life buried beneath their base, were again recognised in the mirror of my dream, with strange and minute fidelity. And yet this was a whimsey of the mind which required no Memphis for its explanation. "Within eight miles of my present lowly hostel, was the site of a revered and venerable mansion, which my fancy represented still standing in its antique hospitable pride, under whose shelter, half a century before, I had passed much of my sunny childhood; but the property had changed hands, and since ten years of age I had not revisited Holt Manor. But now, in my imagination, I was there-still, still a boytime and childhood were recalled-the fifty years' account had not been registered against me, nor had I entered on the mazy wanderings of an unknown world. In fine, I dreamt I had but dreamt of lifethat I was the same joyous being revelling in happy ignorance of all the machinery of moral art-the schoolboy guest-the spoiled child of Holt and its honoured possessor-for, 'I had drank with the father-had talked with the mother- The bright rays of an autumnal sun piercing the oriel window of my dormitory, reproved my slumbers at an early hour. For some moments I was bewildered as to which was the counterfeit and which the original of life's picture; but it was only for some moments-the very happiness I had found in the one was full assurance the dream was there. How faithful is the sage who says, 'Consider yourself equal to the happiest in one half of your life at least; the half which you spend in sleep.' A proof impression, however, I now held before me; for being risen from my bed, I was gazing at my own features in the glass; those admonitory lines which had been engraven by the hand of sixty years. Alas! I could have counted my frosted locks with less difficulty, for they were scantier in number. Thy looks, my thane, are as a book, where men may read strange matters; and thus out of my autobiblical cheeks, I read myself a lecture on the Vanity of Human things! "But my somnolent adventures had now led me to a perfectly new purpose, and I determined on procrastinating the second part of my journey, to make this day one of discovery, in tracing and treading the demesnes of Holt, and thus once more revisit my first home, before my most certain summons to my last. "Having despatched my breakfast, which had offered undeniable evidence of the good-wife's predial economy, namely, eggs and honey, pullets and potted-pig, fain would I have consulted my fruitful landlady (or rather landmark, as the present question might suggest), respecting my course towards the desired spot; but this being someJune.-VOL. LIX. NO. CCXXXIV. R |