Sorrow could scarcely grieve that one who had outlived the full term of years allotted to man, and drank so deeply of earth’s cup of trial, should, at last, in a moment of unhoped for joy to cheer his exit from life, have finally departed; and Alice felt, as she kissed his cold brow, ere the coffin-lid had closed upon it forever, that her deepest feelings of filial affection could not inspire the wish within her to recall his departed spirit. Tears, many and heavy, it is true, were shed over him, but they fell rather for the sorrows he had passed, than because he was thus summoned in the fullness of time to a world where sorrow could never come.
He was followed to the grave, not only by his relations, but by Henry Elmore and his wife, whose feelings on the occasion were scarcely less deep than their own. In them, the deceased as well as his unhappy companion, had found true and sympathizing friends; and to their unremitting care and attention it was that they had not both sunk, long ere the return of Alice, into the same grave to which the one had now finally departed. Governor H. and his excellent lady likewise attended the funeral with much sympathy, and returned afterward to the house of their niece, to rejoice with Alice on her return, and congratulate her husband on the pardon of which he had been the bearer.
An interesting scene ensued, in which Jessy wept upon the necks of those generous friends, and returned her thanks to them for having so long sought to shield her from the misfortunes of her family. Between Lucy and herself a still more affecting embrace followed. The former, through the strict secrecy of her uncle and aunt, had never suspected that the tender name of sister by which she had known Jessy, was only assumed. But though she received the intelligence in some sorrow, it was scarcely of a heartfelt kind; for both had a consciousness that it was in the name alone that a change could take place, and that in feeling and affection they would ever remain sisters still.
Stanley, too, was present on this occasion. His meeting with Jessy at such a season of deep feeling for her had been tender in the extreme; and although he had not as yet had time for many words in private with the object of his affection, she read in his manner and countenance his deep and ardent sympathy.
The rumor of the strange reunion between the parents and child; of the long seclusion of Lisle and Heath in the wing of Henry Elmore’s house, thereby explaining all the mystery formerly attached to it, soon spread throughout the colony. But it scarcely excited the astonishment which such a romance in real life would create at the present day, for those were periods of tragical confusion and strange catastrophe, for better or for worse, when the rendings asunder of domestic charities were often without an hour’s warning, and where reunions were as dramatic as any exhibited on the stage.
It created little surprise, therefore, when Heath removed to Boston with his gentle and lovely wife, there to reside permanently, or when Jessy Ellet appeared as an inmate of their family.
It was just three months after this removal that Stanley and Jessy were united in marriage. No wedding-party was invited to grace the occasion; but Governor and Mrs. H. and Henry Elmore and his wife were the only guests.
We will now bid the reader adieu, leaving him to imagine that henceforth the fortunes of all of our characters ran in as smooth a tide as is possible in this world. We all know that the stream of actual life flows in an even course with but few. With most it is—romance aside—as our tale has shown it, a confused succession of alternating sensations, sometimes dark and dull of hue, like the clouds of winter, at others, breaking out into the glowing splendor and bright illusions of a dream.
