"And what was his reply?" cried I.
"Good advice—good advice, sir," sobbed Bessum. "He asked her if she did not think she had better go to her old nurse!"
Mute with amazement and disgust, I sank back in my chair.
"What!" cried I, when the power of articulation returned; "was that the good advice?"
"Ay, sir,—ay! that was all the comfort our poor dear got from her lover; she asked him for no more. She didn't upbraid him. He had dealt her death-blow, and she followed his advice; she came to her old nurse, sir,—God be praised!—and I and David closed her precious eyes for ever, after they had lingered, in their last dim sight, on the lifeless image of him, whose name, with her forgiveness, and prayer to Heaven for his happiness, were the last words upon her sweet, sweet lips!"
"And if a special hand is not upraised to strew his path of life with tenfold the sharp pangs that he employed to drive his victim to an early grave," cried I, "it can only be that it has already crushed the monster into death."
My heart was faint and sick at the recital I had heard. I returned to my inn; and all that night—for it was in vain that I attempted to sleep—I mused upon this awful dispensation of the wrath of Heaven, and the dread severity with which the wisdom of vindictive Providence had stricken the transgression of poor little Harri!
Eugenius.