I have just been at my window, and never beheld so gloomy a night—not a star twinkles through the massy clouds that are driven impetuously along by the sudden gusts of a rising storm—not a ray of light partially dissipates the profound obscurity, save what falls on a fragment of an opposite tower, and seems to issue from the window of a closet which joins the apartment of Glorvina. She has not yet then retired to rest, and yet ’tis unusual for her to sit up so late. For I have often watched that little casement—its position exactly corresponds with the angle of the castle where I am lodged.
If I should have any share in the vigils of Glorvina!!!
I know not whether to be most gratified or hurt at the manner in which she took leave of me. Was it indifference, or resentment, that marked her manner? She certainly was surprised, and her surprise was not of the most pleasing nature—for where was the magic smile, the sentient blush, that ever ushers in and betrays every emotion of her ardent soul! Sweet being! whatever may be the sentiments which the departure of the supposed unfortunate wanderer awakens in thy bosom, may that bosom still continue the hallowed asylum of the dove of peace! May the pure heart it enshrines still throb to the best impulses of the happiest nature, and beat with the soft palpitation of innocent pleasure and guileless transport, veiled from the rude intercourse of that world to which thy elevated and sublime nature is so eminently superior; long amidst the shade of the venerable ruins of thy forefathers mayest thou bloom and flourish in undisturbed felicity! the ministering angel of thy poor compatriots, who look up to thee for example and support—thy country’s muse, and the bright model of the genuine character of her daughters, when unvitiated by erroneous education and by those fatal prejudices which lead them to seek in foreign refinements for those talents, those graces, those virtues which are no where to be found more flourishing, more attractive than in their native land.
H. M.
LETTER XV.
TO J. D. ESQ., M. P.
M———— House.
It certainly requires less nicety of perception to distinguish differences in kind than differences in degree; but though my present, like my past situation, is solitudinous in the extreme, it demands no very great discernment to discover that my late life was a life of solitude—my present, of desolation.
In the castle of Inismore I was estranged from the world: here I am estranged from myself. Yet so much more sequestered did that sweet interesting spot appear to me, that I felt, on arriving at this vast and solitary place (after having passed by a few gentlemen’s seats, and caught a distant view of the little town of Bally——,) as though I were returning to the world—but felt as if that world had no longer any attraction for me.