LETTER LI.
Mr. Hall having, as I told you in my last, obligingly agreed to favour me with a relation of his story, I now give it to you as nearly in his own words as 1 can remember them. He proceeded thus:
“Although you are now, my dear friend! a witness to my being the most perfectly wretched of all created beings, yet the time is not long past when fortune smiled upon and gave me promise of as much happiness as Man in this wretched vale of tears is allowed by his circumscribed nature to hope for. I have seen the time, when each revolving sun rose to usher me to a day of joy, and set to consign me to a night of undisturbed repose——when the bounties of Nature, and the productions of Art, were poured with the profusion of fond paternal affection into my lap——when troops of friends hailed my rising prospects——when health and peace made this person their uninterrupted abode——and when the most benignant love that ever blessed a mortal filled up the measure of my bliss. Yes, Campbell! it was once my happiness, though now, alas! the source of poignant misery, to be blessed with the best parents that ever watched over the welfare of a child——with friends, too, who loved me, and whom my heart cherished——and——O God! do I think of her, and yet retain my senses——with the affections of a young lady, than whom Providence, in the fullness of its power and bounty to Mankind, never formed one more lovely, one more angelic in person, more heavenly in disposition, more rich in intellectual endowments. Alas! my friend, will you, can you pardon those warm ebullitions of a fond passion? will you for a moment enter into my feelings, and make allowance for those transports? But how can you? Your friendship and pity may indeed induce you to excuse this interruption; but, to sympathise truly, and feel as I feel, you must have known the charming girl herself.
“My father, though he did not move in the very first walk of life, held the rank of a Gentleman by birth and education, and was respectable, not only as a man of considerable property, but as a person who knew how to turn the gifts of fortune to their best account: he was generous without prodigality, and charitable without ostentation: he was allowed by all who knew him to be the most tender of husbands——the most zealous and sincere of friends; and I can bear witness to his being the best of parents. As long as I can remember to have been able to make a remark, the tenderness of both my father and mother knew no bounds: I seemed to occupy all their thoughts, all their attention; and in a few years, as I thank God I never made an unsuitable return for their affection, it increased to such a degree, that their existence seemed to hang upon mine.
“To make as much of a child so beloved as his natural talents would allow, no expence was spared in my education: from childhood, every instruction that money could purchase, and every allurement to learn that fondness could suggest, were bestowed upon me; while my beloved father, tracing the advances I made with the magnifying eye of affection, would hang over me in rapture, and enjoy by anticipation the fame and honours that, overweening fondness suggested to him, must one day surround me. These prejudices, my dear friend! arising from the excess of natural affection, are excuseable, if not amiable, and deserve a better fate than disappointment. Alas! my honoured father, you little knew——and, oh! may you never know, what sort of fame, what sort of honours, await your child! May the anguish he endures, and his most calamitous fate, never reach your ears!——for, too well I know, ’twould give a deadly wrench to your heart, and precipitate you untimely to your grave.
“Thus years rolled on; during which, time seemed to have added new wings to his flight, so quickly did they pass. Unmarked by any of those sinister events that parcel out the time in weary stages to the unfortunate, it slid on unperceived; and an enlargement in my size, and an increase of knowledge, were all I had to inform me that eighteen years had passed away.
“It was at this time that I first found the smooth current of my tranquillity interrupted, and the tide of my feelings swelled and agitated, by the accession of new streams of sensation——In short, I became a slave to the delicious pains of Love; and, after having borne them in concealment for a long time, at length collected courage to declare it. Frankness and candour were among the virtues of my beloved: she listened to protestations of affection, and, rising above the little arts of her sex, avowed a reciprocal attachment. The measure of my bliss seemed now to be full: the purity of my passion was such, that the thoughts of the grosser animal desires never once occurred; and happy in loving, and in being beloved, we passed our time in all the innocent blandishments which truly virtuous Love inspires, without our imagination roaming even for an instant into the wilds of sensuality.
“As I was to inherit a genteel, independent fortune, my father proposed to breed me up to a learned profession——the Law; rather to invigorate and exercise my intellects, and as a step to rank in the State, than for mere lucrative purposes. I was put to one of the Universities, with an allowance suited to his intentions towards me; and was immediately to have been sent to travel for my further improvement, when an unforeseen accident happened, which completely crushed all my father’s views, dashed the cup of happiness from my lips, and brought me ultimately to that deplorable state in which you have now the misfortune to be joined, along with me.
“It was but a few months antecedent to my embarking for the Eastern World, that my father, whom I had for some time with sorrow observed thoughtful, studious and melancholy, took me into his study, and, seizing my hand, and looking earnestly into my face, while his countenance betrayed the violent agitation of his mind, asked me emphatically, if I thought I had fortitude to bear the greatest possible calamity? I was horror-struck at his emotion, accompanied by such a question——but replied, I hoped I had. He then asked me, if I had affection enough for him to forgive him if he was the cause of it? I answered, that the idea connected with the word forgiveness, was that which I could never be brought by any earthly circumstance to apply to my father; but begged him at once to disclose the worst to me——as, be it what it might, my misery could not surpass what I then felt from the mysterious manner in which he then spoke.
“He then told me that he was an undone man——that he had, with the very best intentions, and with the view of aggrandizing me, engaged in great, and important speculations, which, had they succeeded, would have given us a princely fortune——but, having turned out, unfortunately, the reverse, had left him little above beggary. He added, that he had not the resolution to communicate his losses to me, until necessity compelled him to tell me all the truth.
“Although this was a severe shock to me, I endeavoured to conceal my feelings from my father, on whose account, more than on my own, I was affected, and pretended to make as light of it as so very important a misfortune would justify; and I had the happiness to perceive that the worthy man took some comfort from my supposed indifference. I conjured him not to let so very trivial a thing as the loss of property, which could be repaired, break in on his peace of mind or health, which could not; and observed to him, that we had all of us still enough——for that my private property (which I possessed independent of him, and which, a relation left me) would amply supply all our necessities.
“Having thus endeavoured to accommodate my unhappy father’s feelings to his losses, I had yet to accommodate my own; and began to revolve in my mind what was likely to ensue from, and what step was most proper to be taken in, this dreadful change of circumstances. That which lay nearest to my heart first occurred;——you will readily guess that I mean my Love: to involve her I loved more, far more, than my life, in the misfortunes of my family, was too horrible a consideration to be outweighed even by the dread of losing her. I knew not what to do, and I thought upon it till I became almost enfrenzied——In this state I went to her, and unfolded the whole state of our concerns, together with my resolution not to involve her in our ruin;——when——can you believe it?——the lovely girl insisted on making my fate indissolubly her’s——not, as she said, that she had the smallest apprehension lapse of time or change of circumstance could make an alteration in our affection, but that she wished to give my mind that repose which I might derive from security. This I would by no means accede to; and, for the present, we contented ourselves with mutual vows of eternal fidelity.
“As soon as I thought my father’s mind fit for such a conversation, I opened to him a plan I had formed of coming to India, to advance my fortune. His understanding approved of it, but his heart dissented; and he said, that to part with me would give the finishing stroke to his misfortunes: but, as my interest was tolerably good, I represented to him the great likelihood I had of success; and at last, with some difficulty, he consented.
“My next step was to acquaint Miss ——- with my resolution. I purposely pass over a meeting which no power of language can describe!——then how can I?——Oh! Campbell, the remembrance of it gnaws me like a vulture here,” (and he put his hand upon his heart, while the tears rolled down his cheeks), “and will soon, soon bring me to my end.
“Not to detain you with vain efforts to describe all our feelings, I will confine myself to telling you, that after having made every necessary preparation, and divided with my much honoured parents the little property I possessed, I set sail for India, in a state of mind compared with which the horrors of annihilation would have been enviable: the chaos in my thoughts made me insensible to every object but one; and I brooded with a sort of stupid, gloomy indulgence, over the portrait of Miss ——-, which hung round my neck, and was my inseparable companion, till the people who seized me as I came ashore plundered me of it, and thereby deprived me of the last refuge for comfort I had left. Oh! monsters! barbarians! had you glutted your savage fury by dissevering my limbs, one after another, from my body, it would have been mercy, compared with depriving me of that little image of her I love! But it is all over, and I shall soon sink into the grave, and never more be blessed with the view of those heavenly features, till we meet in that region where all tears are wiped away, and where, I trust, we shall be joined together for endless ages, in eternal, never-fading bliss!”