For many weary years I have been pent up in this prison, pining for freedom, hoping for things which never existed, conjuring up anticipations of a brighter future, calling upon her who made
“The starlight of my boyhood,”
to look down upon me from her blest abode, and woo me back to calmness by one gentle word, one loving glance; and then sinking into hopeless, bitter despondency, when I remembered that she was gone, and that I should see her no more.
Sometimes I can think of her in her exquisite beauty, and my soul drinks in, as it were, the sweet and liquid tones of the voice which once spoke peace to me, and, fancying her again before me, I sink into an unquiet slumber, till some hideous dream oppresses me, and I see the fair brow of my “Julia” contracted, withered; and instead of her silvery voice of enchantment, a hissing sound escapes the lips I have worshipped. I rise, and try to approach, but she recedes. I awake—I start from my uneasy bed—I find this horrible picture, which bore the impress of reality, is but a dream. I awake to the consciousness that my beloved is dead, and that my eyes will gaze upon her beauty no more.
How few there are in this busy world who, when passing those abodes of wretchedness—“private madhouses”—can imagine the agony, the misery, the despair that dwells there! But to my history.
I was the only child of General Sir Frederick and Lady Charlotte B——. I was reared in luxury; the rude air was scarcely allowed to blow upon my delicate frame. I can remember now, though years have passed, and sorrow has bowed me—I can remember the happy days when my wearied head was pillowed on the bosom of my mother, and, after she had sung me to sleep with some wild melody, she would place me in my small luxurious cot, and watch over me with those deep-loving eyes, and be the first to comfort and re-assure me if uneasy dreams—for even then I was a dreamer—made me awake to sorrow. But my mother died. Even now I shudder at the recollection of the desolateness of my agony when I knew I had looked on her for the last time. Even now I can feel the coldness which crept over me as I laid my cheek to hers. My blood was frozen. I could not weep. Oh! tears would have been a relief, but they were denied me; and though I saw her taken from my embrace, and her beloved form laid in the vault, I could still gaze with speechless agony—but I wept not.
How I wished for the quiet of the grave; for even then there was a whirlwind within my bosom, and my sensitive heart shrank from holding converse with, or bestowing confidence on another as freely or unreservedly as I had done with the dear being whom I had lost.
Shortly after this event my father was ordered upon foreign service, and my childhood was passed among relatives who were strangers to me. It was a childhood without love. I remembered my mother, and none could supply her place. I could not trust in another as I had trusted in her. In my sorrows, real or imaginary, none other could comfort me. I longed for my childhood’s resting-place, where I might again pillow my aching head, and sleep once more the calm sleep hallowed by a mother’s matchless love.
At an early age I was sent to one of our great public schools, and there, although I endured some hardships, yet I experienced also something like the pleasures and pastimes of boyhood.
From having been a weakly, delicate child, I grew strong and active; but a gloom was ever upon me.