An incident tended to confirm this resolution. He one night dreamed that he was sitting in a strange house, contemplating on his present situation, when Melissa suddenly entered the room. Her appearance was more pale, sickly and dejected, than when he last saw her. Her elegant form had wasted away, her eyes were sunk, her cheeks fallen, her lips livid. He fancied it to be night, she held a candle in her hand, smiling languidly upon him;—she turned and went out of the room, beckoning him to follow: he thought he immediately arose and followed her. She glided through several winding rooms, and at length he lost sight of her, and the light gradually fading away, he was involved in deep darkness.—He groped along, and at length saw a faint distant glimmer, the course of which he pursued, until he came into a large room, hung with black tapestry, and illuminated by a number of bright tapers. On one side of the room appeared a hearse, on which some person was laid: he went up to it—the first object that arrested his attention was the lovely form of Melissa, shrouded in the sable vestments of death! Cold and lifeless, she lay stretched upon the hearse, beautiful even in dissolution; the dying smile of complacency had not yet deserted her cheek. The music of her voice had ceased; her fine eyes had closed for ever. Insensible to objects in which she once delighted; to afflictions which had blasted her blooming prospects, and drained the streams of life, she lay like blossomed trees of spring, overthrown by rude and boisterous winds. The deep groans which convulsed the distracted bosom, and shocked the trembling frame of Alonzo, broke the delusive charm: he awoke, rejoiced to find it but a dream, though it impressed his mind with doleful and portentous forebodings.
It was a long time before he could again close his eyes to sleep; he at length fell into a slumber, and again he dreamed. He fancied himself with Melissa, at the house of her father, who had consented to their union, and that the marriage ceremony between them was there performed. He thought that Melissa appeared as she had done in her most fortunate and sprightly days, before the darts of adversity, and the thorns of affliction, had wounded her heart. Her father seemed to be divested of all his awful sternness, and gave her to Alonzo with cheerful freedom. He awoke, and the horrors of his former dream were dissipated by the happy influences of the last.
“Who knows, he said, but that this may finally be the case; but that the sun of peace may yet dispel the glooms of these distressful hours!” He arose, determined to return home in a few days. He went out and enjoyed his morning walk in a more composed frame of spirits than he had for some time experienced. He returned, and as he was entering the door he saw the weekly newspaper of the town, which had been published that morning, and which the carrier had just flung into the hall.——The family had not yet arisen. He took up the paper, and carried it to his chamber, and opened it to read the news of the day. He ran his eye hastily over it, and was about to lay it aside, when the death list arrested his attention, by a display of broad black lines. The first article he read therein was as follows:
“[Died, of a consumption], on the 26th ult. at the seat of her uncle, Col. W. D—, near Charleston, South Carolina, whither she had repaired for her health,
Miss Melissa D——, the amiable daughter of J—— D——, Esq. of *******, Connecticut, in the eighteenth year of her age.”
The paper fell from the palsied hand—a sudden faintness came upon him—the room grew dark—he staggered, and fell senseless upon the floor.
For variations on the [death notice], see end of e-text.
The incidents of our story will here produce a pause.——The fanciful part of our readers may be ready to cast it aside in chagrin and disappointment. “Such an event,” may they say, “we were not prepared to expect.—After so many, and such various trials of heart; after innumerable difficulties surmounted; almost invincible objects overcome, and insuperable barriers removed—after attending the hero and heroine of your tale through the diversified scenes of anxiety, suspense, hope, disappointment, expectation, joy, sorrow, anticipated bliss, sudden and disastrous woe——after elevating them to the threshold of happiness, by the premature death of one, to plunge the other, instantaneously, in deep and irretrievable despair, must not, cannot be right.—Your story will hereafter become languid and spiritless; the subject will be uninteresting, the theme unengaging, since the genius
which animated and enlivened it is gone for ever.”