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ST. CLAIR; 
 
 OR, THE 
 
 HEIRESS OF BESMONB. 
 
 By S. O. 
 
 «' The prohibition of hurting others Internally is, perhaps, 
 not essential to the foundation of societies, because the 
 transgression of that law doth not much alarm plain people. 
 But, where manners and refined sentiments prevail, the mind 
 IS susceptible of more grievous wounds than the body, and 
 therefore, without that law, a polished society would have 
 no lon^ endurance." 
 
 Lord Kaimes's Sketches of Morality, p. 282. 
 
 " Perche crudo Destino, 
 
 Ne disunice tu s'amor ne stringe 
 
 E, tu' perche ne stringe 
 
 Si ne parte il Dentin Perfido amor ?" 
 
 GUARtNI. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 ?Il"rNTEO FOR E. HARDING, CROWN AND MITRE, NO. 100» 
 
 PALL MALT.; S. HIGHLEY, FLEET STREET; ANO 
 
 J. ARCHER, DAME STREET, DUBLIN, 
 
 1803, 
 
S. GosKELt, Printer, 
 Little Q.ueen Street, Holboriii 
 
r 
 
 C^2 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The following little work Is simple and 
 obvious in its tendency ; it aims at those 
 moral evils, above which, the mind broken 
 to the refrigerative principles of prudence 
 and philosophy, rises superior ; and to 
 which the mind of common-place reflection 
 and ordinary capacity is invulnerable. It 
 is addressed, therefore, to those sentient 
 beings, who, in ascending the scale of in- 
 tellectual refinement, incur the probability 
 of graduating through each sad degree of 
 intellectual suiFering, of which the human 
 mind is susceptible. 
 
 Children of passion and of sentiment, 
 it is to you it is addressed ; to you, whom 
 the warm effusions of refined feeling, and 
 the glowing visions of animated fancy, 
 lead in flowery trammels beyond the ^^ ftai 
 rgalltres of life ;" whose errors are of the 
 A 2 imagina- 
 
IV 
 
 imagination, bnt whose sorrows are of the 
 heart. Philosophy and ignorance are ahke 
 exempt from the influence by which you 
 are governed ; the former contemns what 
 it cannot feel, the latter derides what it 
 does not understand. 
 
 Exquisite native sensibiUty, nurtured by 
 habit, subtilized by the refinements of 
 superior education, united to a tender 
 heart and lively imagination, and accom- 
 panied by the proud consciousness of 
 merit superior to the fortune of its pos- 
 sessor, is, perhaps, the most fatal donation 
 within the gift of nature. A mind simi- 
 larly organized, feels itself alone in the 
 midst of life's busiest scenes ; isolated and 
 unconnected, it in vain unfolds the rich 
 hoard of its affections, and claims, with- 
 out being heard, the congenial smile of a 
 sympathizing friend; tender and ardent, 
 it languishes in secret and unceasing anxi- 
 ety to form a still more endearing asso- 
 ciation ; and the long and fondly-sought 
 treasure ones discovered, it pursues its at- 
 tainment. 
 
talnment, even when opposed by circum- 
 Btances, and condemned by reason, 
 
 *' D'uu aveugle penchant te charm imperceptible 
 Frappe, saisit, entraine, et rend un cceur sensible." 
 
 CoRNEILLE. 
 
 sanctioning Its errors by the plausible so- 
 phistry of perverted understanding, and 
 frraly attached to virtue in her most obvious 
 point of view, insensibly violating those 
 minor and social laws by which her power 
 over mankind is best supported. 
 
 The following little work, though writ- 
 ten at a time of life when invention is 
 more alive than judgment, is yet almost 
 destitute of plot ; and the few incidents 
 it relates may probably be traced, with 
 little variation, in the domestic records of 
 many an amiable family, whose peace has 
 been sacrificed to the sentimental impru- 
 dence and ardent passions of its most 
 highly gifted member ; evincing that the 
 best informed mind, even when associated 
 with the worthiest heart, by insensibly re- 
 signing itself to the impulses of a strong 
 A 3 but 
 
but fatal propensity, may wound, in those 
 delicate points which the scrutiny of the 
 law cannot reach, that society it was cal- 
 culated to enrich by its virtues, by its en- 
 dowments to adorn. 
 
 The conception, however, of the best 
 design is frequently frustrated in its exe- 
 cution ; and the fond and busy wishes of 
 the philanthropist are not always succeeded 
 by those abilities which are called on to 
 realize them : and though the heart of 
 the author of the following pages may sigh 
 over the inadequate exertions of genius to 
 assist its efforts, it must still cherish some 
 latent solace in the conscious rectitude of 
 its intentions. The animating plaudits of 
 public approbation may refuse to add a 
 livelier throb to its pulsation ; but the 
 faint beam of internal satisfaction will still 
 linger to cheer the gloom of its disap- 
 pointed hopes. 
 
 November "jih, 1802, 
 
 ST* 
 
ST. C L A I R. 
 
 LETTIH I. 
 
 Dublin, March Sih, 1 7—, 
 
 Ths mlnbter has at last dismissed me ; 
 the disappointment came like a reprieve ; 
 you will smile at the paradox, but you 
 will understand me — my nature is restored 
 to its dignity. I blush to think it could 
 suffer from adventitious circumstances. 
 The human mind should hold itself inde- 
 pendent of the little trials and vicissitudes 
 of every-day life ; it should repose in the 
 strength of its own dignity ; and the im- 
 mortal gift of the Deity should rise supe- 
 rior to the petty caprices and oppressions 
 of man : and yet, my dear friend, to be 
 totally uninfluenced by situation, is per- 
 haps the standard of philosophic perfec- 
 tion. I smiled at my father's relation of 
 the fallacy of a great man's promise, as 
 the cynical observation of a man, on. 
 A 4 whora 
 
8 
 
 whom the world frowned ; and I should 
 have smiled at it still, had I not been a 
 sufferer by it : so true it is that infallible 
 conviction is only to be gathered from 
 practical experience. In private society 
 every man is allowed to consult his private 
 feelings in the disposition of his favours ; 
 a man in office is to have none : — this man 
 has given the situation he intended for 
 ine to his own nephew : all this is very- 
 natural ; I only wish he had done it 
 sooner, as it would have saved me some 
 hours of tedious attendance and mortifi- 
 cation. I cannot bear to think of it ; my 
 Lord has taken it as a matter of course — 
 shakes his head — looks wise, and says, 
 ** Something better may offer itself" I 
 have told him it must not be obtained 
 by waiting on the levee of a great man ; 
 he smiles compassionately, and sometimes 
 titters the word, "romantic." This will 
 give you some kind of insight into what 
 sort of man it is ; " his mind a standing 
 pool, his heart a dyke." As yet however 
 I have seen but little of hini» and known 
 less, though his relative and guest. Pray 
 write to my mother when you receive 
 this ; say every thing you can to her — 
 " her tender buds of hope" have been 
 so often blasted, I feel for her; this new 
 disappointment, — but it is unavoidable i 
 your manner of writing will cheer her 
 
 mind. 
 
9 
 
 mind, and mine must produce a contrary 
 effect ; add a little postscript too, to Lydia 
 and Nanette, and tell them though I am 
 not to be a minister of state, I may be a 
 commander in chief, or a vice-admiral ; 
 but that, at this moment, I would rather 
 be one in their dear little circle, than giv- 
 ing audience to a cringing levee, in all 
 the pomp of office and glare of conse- 
 quence. 
 
 D — has failed to an immense 
 
 amount, and the wreck of my father's 
 little property will afford a very limited 
 subsistence to my mother and sisters. 
 Under such circumstances it would be 
 madness to have rejected the offered pa- 
 tronage of Lord L- . Yet I feel that 
 
 I owe it more to the kind interference 
 of your father, than to the dying request 
 of mine, or the suggestions of his Lord- 
 ship's own generosity. 
 
 LETTER II. 
 
 The first thing that Descartes (who 
 made scepticism the leading principle of 
 his philosophic system) found to be cer- 
 tain, was, " that he thought and rea- 
 soned j" and this is at present the only 
 A 5' thing 
 
10 
 
 thing of which I am not certain. The 
 bustle in which I am obHged to participate, 
 prevents study and bids detiance to reflec- 
 tion ; and while I live in what is called 
 the first company, I can yet find no so- 
 ciety; every heart that I would interest, 
 seems to congeal as I address it ; and 
 every being to whom I would connect my- 
 self, either does not or will not understand 
 rae. Then I languish for that intercourse 
 of mind, when animal existence seems to 
 suffer a momentary suspension, as the 
 soul unfolds her powers ! My dear friend^ 
 I have known moments of bliss ; I have 
 known them in the bosom of my family, 
 in the endearments of social life, and in 
 the blessings of friendship ; but I am con- 
 vinced, that I am capable of being hap- 
 pier than I have yet been, and that there 
 are feelings dormant in my heart, more 
 powerful, more poignant, than any which 
 the circumstances of my life have awa- 
 kened into being. I see plainly, my first 
 day's acquaintance with these people will 
 form the boundary of our intimacy ; like 
 the greater part of the world, they glide 
 down the stream of popular opinion, and 
 carefully avoid all those brambles and 
 briers, which reason or nature fling in 
 their course ; they avoid the trouble of 
 thinking for themselves, and are thankful 
 that people thought for them a thousand 
 
 years 
 
II 
 
 years before, without ever consulting that 
 measure of reason which the Deity has 
 endowed them with. This is in a certain 
 degree the character of mankind epitomiz- 
 ed. Lord L was a patriot, but his 
 
 Lordship has formed two thousand argu- 
 ments against the patriotic system, in a 
 place of two thousand a year. Sydney and 
 Russel sold themselves to France ; and he 
 says that he has only acted as all patriots 
 would willingly act, if the ministry would 
 but come up to their price. Such, indeed, 
 was the opinion of Sir Robert Walpole,. 
 who, it is to be feared, found the infalli- 
 bility of his maxim, in the corruption of 
 those he brought to its test. Lady L — •— 
 is perfectly the woman of fashion, and 
 
 that is all Lady L requires to be ; rank 
 
 and opulence take in with her the whole 
 scale of human perfection ; you may judge, 
 therefore, how far I have ascended that of 
 her esteem. She treats me, however, with 
 that indiscriminating and insipid courtesy, 
 which she means should pass for atfability 
 and condescension ;. and if her face is ever 
 susceptible of expression, it is when I dare 
 maintain an opinion of my own, in op- 
 position toi one of my Lord's, or some of 
 his noble guests. As for herself, she never 
 has an opinion, and her conversation is an 
 incessant repetition of common- place re- 
 flections, which one hears bandied about 
 A 6 from* 
 
12, 
 
 from every moutli, whether of the vulgar 
 little, or the vulgar great. They are both 
 esteemed the best people in the world, and 
 are, in short, just such people as one meets 
 with every day, and every where ; and 
 these are the persons on whose bounty I 
 am thrown, on whom I am dependant : 
 I dependant ! oh merciful Heaven I never ! 
 with youth and health, never ! 
 
 I am just returned from the study of 
 
 Lord L . The last assertion of my pen 
 
 trembled on my lips as I entered it. I re- 
 peated to him what I had written to you. 
 My father was very blameable, he said, 
 for educating me in such obsolete and ro- 
 mantic notions ; however, his eldest son 
 would be in Ireland in a few weeks, and 
 he had interest both in the civil and mili- 
 tary departments, which he was sure he 
 would be happy, both as a friend and as a 
 relation, to exert in my favour : in the 
 interim the preceptor of his youngest boys 
 having been lately promoted to a living, 
 if r would amuse myself with the super- 
 intendence of their education, it would 
 lighten the burden of that imaginary de- 
 pendance I supported with so much rest- 
 less impatience. — Thus, my dear friend, I 
 have got some little part to play upon the 
 theatre of life. I have obtained permissiori 
 of my Lord, to set off for his seat in Con- 
 naught, with my little pupils, immedi- 
 ately. 
 
^3 
 
 ately. This is the first satisfaction I have felt 
 since I left Switzerland. I am weary of this 
 town ; in short, I fear I am weary of myfelf» 
 When the inclinations and pursuits of early 
 life methodize into habit and form into 
 principle, every change is considered as 
 a trial, and every deviation as a persecu- 
 tion. 
 
 I had almost forgot to mention this son, 
 on whom I am to depend for my future 
 prospects : he is the colonel of a regiment, 
 a member of the Irish parliament, and has 
 some interest with the ministry. The se- 
 cond son is a major in his brother's regi- 
 ment. The colonel and his brother are re- 
 turning from the continent with a skeleton 
 regiment, and behaved, I am told, with 
 the most intrepid gallantry at the siege of 
 
 ■ . I have just received your letter. 
 
 Your questions made me smile ! You cer- 
 tainly have a great deal of academic fresh' 
 ness about you ! Ah ! what a pity that the 
 coarse friction of the world should destroy 
 this beautiful gloss 1 Why did your parents 
 educate you in Switzerland, that you 
 might live in London ? No, my dear friend, 
 I did not, like Ulysses, kiss the earth, 
 when I first touched the shores of my na- 
 tive place ; I beheld them from the bay, 
 with the eye of a painter and a poet, rather 
 than a patriot. 
 
 *' Among 
 
14 
 
 " Among numberless extravagancies 
 \vhich pass through the minds of men," 
 says Lord Bolingbroke, *' we may justly 
 reckon for one, that notion of a secret af- 
 fection, independent of our reason, and 
 superior to our reason, which we are sup- 
 posed to have for our country, as if there 
 was some physical virtue in each spot of 
 ground, which necessarily produced this 
 effect in every one born upon it." This 
 prejudice, however, is among the few I 
 have weeded from my mind, and the 
 only recollection I retained of my country 
 (which I left in childhood) is associated 
 with so melancholy a reflection of the in- 
 juries my father suffered in it, from the 
 religious bigotry and unkindness of his 
 family, as rather to create an emotion of 
 disgust than a thrill of enthusiasm, in again 
 beholding it. 
 
 It is scarcely ten years back since Lord 
 
 Jj , by renouncing the faith of his 
 
 ancestors, obtained the restoration of 
 those titles and dignities which they had 
 conscientiously sacrificed, from a principle 
 of virtue that has gradually decayed in its 
 descent to their posterity. My father 
 seemed to have anticipated the apostacy 
 of his family, and was an age gone in 
 heresy, and deep in Luther, Melancthon, 
 
 and Erasmus ; while his cousiaLord L ■ 
 
 was 
 
^5 
 
 was still Involved in all the^cred mystery 
 of transubstantiation, and wading throngh 
 Thomas Aquinas and the council of Trent 
 with his Jesuitical tutor. The early apo- 
 stacy of my father, and his imprudent (at 
 least so in the eyes of the world) marriage, 
 rendered him an object of persecution to 
 his family ; and, with a younger brother's 
 portion, he sought a retreat under the 
 tolerancy of a Swiss republic, where, 
 influenced by an habitual indolence, 
 and the debility of a shattered constitution, 
 he passed the last twenty years of his life, 
 in literary retirement, and the cultivation 
 of a romantic farm, on the shores of the 
 delightful lake of Geneva. While the 
 spiritual concession of his noble relative 
 has been productive of all the temporal 
 aggrandizement he expected, ray father's 
 nevo light, to speak paradoxically, involved 
 his worldly prospects in obscurity ; and his 
 family, by " outward and very visible signs,'"' 
 are still suffering for his " inzvard and spi- 
 ritual grace." Thus different as the no- 
 tions which influenced them, have beeri 
 the fates of the apostate cousins. I am 
 sorry I must disappoint your expectations, 
 by sending you only " a map of my mind," 
 when you demand a chart du faySy includ- 
 ing a sketch of society and manners, &c. 
 &c. But the fact is, the general inter- 
 course of nations m the present day, and 
 
 uiiiverfal 
 
i6 
 
 universal promulgation of knowledge, 
 leave the mind of a modern traveller but 
 little scope for the due exercise of its pe- 
 netration, in the discovery of national 
 character; that of the Irish we have both 
 read a thousand times, and were it other- 
 wise, on my own observation, I should 
 hazard little, as those whose aggregate 
 constitute the people, and may be suppos- 
 ed best to preserve the national stamp, I 
 have no opportunity of mingling with; 
 and the people of fashion here are like 
 the people of fashion every where else. 
 Adieu. 
 
 LETTER III. 
 
 It is certain, that in the scale of nature 
 there is not a more inseparable connexion 
 of cause and eflect, than between exqui- 
 site sensibility and exquisite misery. I am 
 wretchedly alive to the coldness and in- 
 difierence I meet with in every counte- 
 nance, and vainly sigh to find one mind 
 congenial to my own . My heart, in 
 this dearth of cordial intercourse by which 
 I am surrounded, feeds on the recollection 
 of its past enjoyments ; and my feelings, 
 without one concordant tone to animate 
 their powers, vibrate only in unison to 
 the strains of memory, 
 
 •^. «' Full 
 
" TuII on ourselves descending in a line, 
 Pleasure's bright beam is feeble in delight j 
 Delight intense is taken by rebound ; 
 The verberated pleasure fires the heart." 
 
 The vestal coldness with which your 
 question w^as demanded, made rae smile. 
 Yes, the Irish women are beautiful, emi- 
 nently beautiful, presenting in the soft- 
 ness and vivacity of their manners, all 
 that we most admire in the French, and 
 esteem in the English women ; — and as to 
 education, it is the influenza of the day; 
 they are all artists ; and elegant musicians, 
 painters, and dancers are to be found every 
 where. But, ah! my dear friend, how- 
 difficult to find that cultivation of the in- 
 tellectual graces, that delicacy of taste, 
 that refinement of sentiment, that educa- 
 tion of mind, that soul of manner, which 
 places woman in the sphere for which she 
 was created, holding the intermediate de- 
 gree between angel and man ! There are 
 two lovely beings in the house with me, 
 
 nieces to Lady L , beautiful as the 
 
 houri of Mahomet. Their charms attract 
 me incessantly to their society, — their in- 
 sipidity as incessantly repels me ; I gaze 
 on them with rapture, listen to them with 
 apathy, and leave them without reluctance : 
 thus, they at once carry their '* bane and 
 antidote" about them; and, happily for 
 vny hearty their conversation presents a 
 
 never- 
 
i8 
 
 never-falling remedy to the ills their eyes 
 inflict. 
 
 " I knew," said Madame de Montes- 
 pagne, speaking of her two rivals De 
 Fontange and Maintenon, " I should 
 triumph over the stupid beauty ; but I 
 cannot counteract the witchcraft of an 
 elegant and fascinating conversation." 
 Do you remember my beautiful fugitive 
 nun of Languedoc ? She was my Urst love; 
 and had her mind borne any proportion to 
 her personal attractions, she had probably 
 been my last. Oh ! may I never meet 
 with such a being, whose power over the 
 heart, the passions, and the understanding, 
 is equally irresistible ! 
 
 LETTER IV. 
 
 I WRITE to you, my dear friend, from 
 
 the castle of L ; a venerable structure, 
 
 the residence of my ancestors, and now 
 the refuge of the most friendless of their 
 progeny : it is situated in what may be 
 termed the classic ground of Ireland ; for 
 in this part of Connaught you find the 
 character, the manner, the language, and 
 the music of the ancient Irish in all their 
 primitive originality; and the names Ossian 
 and Finsal are as well known among these 
 
 old 
 
19 
 
 old Milesians as In the Hebrides. To this 
 remote province, whose shores are washed 
 by the " steep Atlantic," were the native 
 Irish driven by political and religious per- 
 secution ; and as a free intercourse between 
 them and the rest of the nation was not 
 established till after the Restoration, I ex- 
 pect to find many of those literary tradi- 
 tions, which throw a light upon the history 
 and character of every country, which has 
 preserved them from the wreck of time, 
 or the devastation of warfare. At present 
 I possess that sort of existence which Pliny 
 the Younger so often languished to enjoy, 
 that of ** being and doing nothing." My 
 little pupils, who were to meet me here 
 from another seat of their father's, are not 
 yet arrived ; the weather confines me to the 
 house, without books, without society ; 
 and placed in that sphere which vibrates 
 between past happiness and future ex- 
 pectation, the intervening chasm of exist- 
 ence is a mere blank, and my own thoughts 
 the very wretchedest companions I could 
 have. 
 
 CONTINUATION. 
 
 " Life," said Pindar, *' is the dream 
 of a shadow :" a sublime definition, and 
 exquisitely expressive of the inconsequence 
 of man : mine is the shadow of a sorry 
 <^,ream indeed. 1 am losing hourly that 
 
liappy faculty of imagination v/hich sheds 
 a false, but pleasing light on my days; 
 hope fades in the gloom of disappointment ; 
 my mind sinks into lethargic slumbers, 
 and the faint beams which my understand- 
 ing emits, serve but to shew me I am 
 wretched. The flow and ebb of joy or sor- 
 row would now roll over my senses unfelt. 
 In short, my dear friend, apathy consumes 
 me; I labour under that depression of mind 
 which slackens the faculties without de- 
 stroying them, which leaves us sensible of 
 the sad vacuity of intellect without the 
 power of remedy. 1 feel that life, if not 
 animated by the tender affections of the 
 heart, is insupportable; and that existence, 
 without some object in view, without some 
 pursuit, without passion, to a mind lively 
 and ardent as mine, whether in the world 
 or in solitude, is " the death of the soul." 
 Last night I trifled away a heavy hour in 
 realizing the following ideas which my 
 situation gave rise to. 
 
 TO APATHY, 
 
 I. 
 
 Thou, whom unknown my bleeding heart implor'd 
 To fling thy spell athwart the anguish'd hour, 
 
 Spirit of Apathy ! unfelt, ador'd, 
 Ah ! now I feel and deprecate thy power. 
 
21 
 
 II. 
 
 This heart, this warmly throbbing, sensate heart, 
 Was never form'd to own thy chilling sway, 
 
 Where festers still the wound of sorrow's dart. 
 Where yet the light of joy reflects a ray. 
 
 III. 
 
 Suspense in all its torturing forms I 've knows, 
 And many a tender, many an anxious fear ; 
 
 And on my lip has died the ftifled groan, 
 And in mine eye has swam the silent tear. 
 
 IV. 
 
 And I have known the blissful transient hour 
 Of heart-sprung ecstacy and pure delight ; 
 
 Rapt, I have worfliipp'd fancy's witching pow'r, 
 And (fond enthusiast!) dar'd her highest flight. 
 
 V. 
 
 But now no raptur'd moment, no soft woe, 
 Can raise the soul, or sublimate the heart; 
 
 Nor can the solemn " joy of grief" bestow 
 An hope — or faith in future bliss impart. 
 
 VI. 
 
 Stagnate each feeling, frozen every sense. 
 
 Each fairy thought enrob'd in languor's stole, 
 
 No visionary bliss can now dispense, 
 Or with an airy nothing cheer the soul. 
 
 VII. 
 
 E'en love, the arch seducer, vainly smiles, 
 
 Flings vainly o'er my couch each bloomy flow'r, 
 
 Gr hovers near me with his trait'rous wiles, 
 And vainly tries his erst acknowledg'd pow'r. 
 
 vin. 
 
22 
 
 VIII. 
 
 But fled for ever is the frolic day, 
 
 When every sense in Pleasure's train enroll'd; 
 Damp'd is each spirit, once so idly gay, 
 
 And all is silent, sullen, tranquil, cold. 
 
 LETTER VI. 
 
 The village schoolmaster having met 
 me two or three times wandering about 
 the rocks with a book in my hand, took 
 it into his head that I was a learned man, 
 and came to pay me a visit in conse- 
 quence ; for he is himself a very erudite 
 personage, and the prince of mathema- 
 ticians; he sends rebusses and charades 
 to the Ladies' Magazine ; expounds riddles, 
 and starts problems, that no one can solve 
 but himself. He opened his learned in- 
 trenchments with Aristotle, talked of ca- 
 tegories, interpretations, and predicables ; 
 of surfaces and solids, sections and sym- 
 bols, triangles and tangible bodies, Bur- 
 gersdic, Des Cartes, and Newton, all in a 
 breath; however, he soon found that *' there 
 were more things in heaven and earth 
 than were dreamt of in my philosophy," 
 and I really believe he parted from me 
 with the happiest assurance of his own 
 
 superiority. 
 
23 
 
 superiority, and of my being little better 
 than a blockhead ; for while he was in the 
 act of defining a quiddity, I interrupted 
 him to inquire into the possibility of pro- 
 curing an old Irish poem I had heard my 
 father repeat. He shook his head con- 
 temptuously, and replied, that he never 
 troubled himself with such barbarous pro- 
 ductions, though Aristotle condescends to 
 mention Ireland, and Strabo speaks of it 
 as being in the possession of the Carthagi- 
 nians. I have seen nothing of my mathe- 
 matical friend since, and my only com- 
 panion is an old house steward, who looks 
 coeval with the castle, and who is so truly 
 attached to the family of L , that he 
 feels a lively interest for its remotest mem- 
 ber ; he loves his glass, sings the best Irish 
 songs in the world, and unites the most 
 respectful manners to a loquacity, when 
 indulged, the most unbounded. From him 
 I learned some characteristical and domestic 
 anecdotes of which I was ignorant. Last 
 night he leaned on the back of my chair 
 while I supped on an excellent salad of 
 his dressing : ** It is five and twenty years, 
 come eve of St. Patrick, young gentle- 
 man," said he, " since I helped your 
 father on with his surtout in this very 
 room ; he came to get my Lord to intercede 
 with his father about marrying the heretic 
 lady, and changing bis religion, but it 
 
 would 
 
24 
 
 would not do; so said I/Please your honour, 
 
 * if you would just speak a word to father 
 
 * Fitzgeraldjhehasacharm against the devil 
 ' and all his works, that would soon bring 
 
 * you back to the church :' but he only shook 
 his head and smiled, just as you do some- 
 times; Sir, when you look very melancholy 
 — it was such a smile as brought the tears 
 into my eyes ; so just as I was barring the 
 great gate after him, he turned round, 
 shook me by the hand, and squeezed a 
 crown piece into it — we never saw him 
 after. Ah ! he was the worthiest and best 
 soul that ever crossed a threshold ; I see 
 ziobody like him in these days at all." 
 
 My dear friend, how fondly does the 
 heart hang upon the praises of the objects 
 of its tenderness and regret ! and a strain 
 of elegiac encomiums to the memory of 
 those we love, is, like the music of Caril, 
 " sweet though mournful to the soul." The 
 eulogiums of this honest old fellow drew 
 a tear of filial pride and affection to my 
 eye; nor was it alone suffused: the dim 
 eyes of Michael bore testimony to the 
 strength of his feelings ; " but be wiped 
 them soon :" and if I am not deep in the 
 politics of the family, it is not Michael's 
 fault ; he has the happy art of painting a 
 character by a single stroke ; and by that 
 he gave me of his second young master, 
 
 Major L , 1 imagine he is what the 
 
 4 young 
 
25 
 
 young Irish gentlemen were some years 
 back, when foreign refinement had not 
 reached them, nor exotic civilization in- 
 troduced the minor morals of hfe into their 
 minds and manners. Michael says he is 
 worthy of the richest heiress in the county, 
 but that the richest heiress in the county 
 is promised in marriage to his elder brother. 
 Michael then digressed into a little episode, 
 which did not form the least interestinix 
 part of his narrative. By the death of an 
 only son, at the age of eighteen OHvia 
 Desmond became only child and heiress 
 to Sir Patrick Desmond, the antiquity of 
 whose family is enriched by the splendour 
 of those actions to which the annals of its 
 country bear testimony. This splendour has 
 not been diminished by its present repre- 
 sentative; in the independence of his soul, 
 and the princely munificence of his hospi- 
 tality, it revives with added dignity. Olivia 
 had been contracted in marriage to my 
 
 relation, the present Lord L , on the 
 
 death of his first lady. The close proximity 
 of two noble estates, and the united 
 strength of two powerful houses, suggested 
 the match; but love sua;2;ested another 
 covenant more consonant to the heart of 
 Olivia : the adopted the seducing so- 
 phistry of his arguments, by eloping with 
 a young man who had educated her bro- 
 ther, and acted as preceptor to herself in 
 B the 
 
16 
 
 ihe polite languages ; and from his lips bis 
 tliarming pupil too soon learned ** it was 
 no sin to love," The resentment of the 
 Baronet was rather fixed and passive than 
 active and transient; he did not pursue 
 the husband of Olivia with that virulence 
 which the law permits, but he abandoned 
 his child; and the vow v^hich cast her for 
 ever an alien from his love and from his 
 inheritance, was breathed on the altar of 
 that God whose sanctuary was violated by 
 the merciless act. 
 
 The sucession of twenty years confirm- 
 ed its inviolability, and the tenderness in- 
 dulged by the twenty years which preceded 
 them, never once returned, to soften the 
 asperity of that resentment which had 
 dictated it. The unpatronized talents of 
 the husband of Olivia placed her in no 
 higher rank of life than the wife of a 
 country schoolmaster in the North of Ire- 
 land. For twenty years, hope still repaired 
 the ravages which filial contrition had in- 
 iiicted ; but when hope had exhausted its 
 balm, her sensibility shrunk beneath the 
 repetition of its attacks, and she died in 
 ihe arms of that husband for whom alone 
 she had lived. One danghler only, was 
 the fruit of this unhappy m.arriage : it was 
 the substituted gift of Heaven for every 
 other blessing. The affcctiunaic child would 
 have expired on the grave of one parent, 
 
 but 
 
^7 
 
 but It was requisite she should live to be 
 the support of another. The spirit of her 
 father drooped over the tomb of his wife ; 
 his attention to his profession slackened, 
 and his school gradually decreased. The 
 education and talents of the yonng Olivia 
 had acquired her some celebrity in the 
 neicrhbourhood in which she lived, and she 
 soon learnt to derive a benefit from them 
 more grateful to her heart than the admi- 
 ration they excited, by their industrious 
 application to increase the little revenue of 
 her father, and to afford him those delica- 
 cies the state of his health and mind re- 
 quired. The mornings of Olivia were 
 devoted to the education of some young 
 females of rank in the neighbourhood, 
 and the evenings to the administering those 
 comforts to her father, her industry had 
 procured him. The decline of her own 
 health was no prevention to those exer- 
 tions, which were stimulated by filial ten- 
 derness and anxious sensibility ; and the 
 mind of Olivia rose superior to the consli- 
 tutional weakness which would have sub- 
 dued its efforts. 
 
 This affecting circumstance was repeat- 
 ed by a mutual friend, to Sir Patrick Des- 
 mond. Death, when it snatched av/ay the 
 object of his resentment, extinguished its 
 last spark in his bosom ; and his heart, ever 
 aliye to virtue, whether suffering or tri- 
 B a umphant^ 
 
umpbant, acknowledges the Interesting 
 and amiable Olivia as the idol of its ten- 
 derest aii'ection. He has already assigned 
 over to her a handsome independence, by 
 which she is enabled to support her father 
 in comparative afHuence, and to indulge 
 the charitable and benevolent propensities 
 of lier hi-art, in their fullest extent. And 
 though she has not yet been able to effect 
 a reconciliation between her two parents, 
 she presides over tlie princely establish- 
 ment, and is the acknowledged heiress of 
 one, without labouring under any painful 
 prohibition with respect to the other. 
 
 It is a singular circum.stance, that those 
 family views, which had been frustrated by 
 the imprudence of the mother, should be 
 not only realized by the daughter, but 
 sanctioned by the tenderest affection of her 
 heart. An attachrqent has long subsisted 
 between Olivia and Colonel L — , and their 
 nuptials only await the return of the 
 Colonel from the continent. '' It was a 
 mortal luird case, your Honour," said 
 Michael, " to be ordered oft^" to foreign 
 pans, as my young master was, just as he 
 had fallen so desperately in love ; and when 
 all matters were about to be made up be- 
 tween n^y lord and the old gentleman, 
 and we ail expected such doings at the 
 castle; — but W'hcn he returns irom tiie 
 wars, llie wedding .will take place. By 
 5 ■ t^'C 
 
29 
 
 the saints we fhall have rare work,---3ncl 
 Sir Patrick will make the walls of the old 
 Abbey ring again, Or my name is not 
 jVlichael M'Carty.*' I know not why this 
 little noveilet of Michael's has interested 
 me, except that it is through the medium 
 of self-love; for Michael prefaced his 
 story by saying, " Myself often does be 
 thinking, so I do, when I sec your Honour 
 coming home all so lonely, after your long 
 walk, with your book in your hand, that 
 you and Madam Olivia would do mortal 
 well toiiether, for fhe loves a Ions; walk 
 alone by herself too; and as to the book, 
 it is never out of her hand, as James the 
 footman says, who attends her in all her 
 visits to the sick poor ; and James says she 
 has more larning than the parson, not to 
 speak of her playing on the harp. I shall 
 never forget after the Colonel was ordered 
 away, ^.nd my Lady brought her to spend 
 some time at the castle, how sweetly she 
 used to sing ' Scar fuint na Companach,' 
 or ' The Parting of Friends ;' but it was 
 always after the family vv'ere gone to bed, 
 and she used to play at the window of a 
 fine still night ; for my Lady, who some- 
 how takes to outlandish song tunes, used 
 to laugh at Miss Livy for singing cronans." 
 I should like to know this Olivia. But 
 she is at present at Bath, with her grand- 
 father, whose ill health obliges him to 
 B 3 spend 
 
30 
 
 spend a part of every year there. I have, 
 however, visited Desmond Abbey, and 
 have discovered on the shores of a lake, 
 v/hose wild romantic scenery recalled the 
 sweet lake of Bienne to my mind, a little 
 lishing'house, fitted up in such an appro- 
 priate style of fanciful elegance as gives the 
 highest idea of the correct taste which pre- 
 sided over its arrangement : there was an 
 yEoIian harp in one of the windows, which 
 vibrated sweetly to the breeze as 1 entered ; 
 and at a little distance from the door, an 
 inscription to the nymph of the lake, which 
 I would have copied lor you, but that two 
 little fragments written on one of the win- 
 dows attracted my attention : one, ad- 
 dressed '' To first Love," was signed Fre- 
 derick L . the other with the initials 
 
 of Olivia's name ; it ran thus i 
 
 PRAGMENT. 
 
 z. 
 
 "While o'er thy lip the melting vow 
 
 Of faith and passion breathes ; 
 And list'ning Mira round thy brow 
 
 Love's blushing chaplet wreathes; 
 
 II. 
 
 Though still a thousand timid fears 
 
 Amidst her hopes arire, 
 The dew thy rosy chaplet wears 
 
 Was shed from IMira's eyes. 
 
 in. 
 
3' 
 
 III. 
 
 Yet like this rose, whose fragrant breath 
 Survives its bloom's decay ; 
 
 So may our loves survive the deatl> 
 Of yoiub and pleasure's day ! 
 
 IT. 
 
 When on the wing of future years 
 Onr youthful raptures flee, 
 
 And time shall realize those fears 
 I ftlc for love and thee j 
 
 Yet still from mem'ry*s record page 
 
 Our faded joys shall rise ; 
 And love shall gild the cloud of age 
 
 Reflected from our eyes. 
 
 Vlr 
 
 Then like this rose, whose fragrant breath 
 
 Survives its bloom's decay ; 
 So may our loves survive the death 
 
 Of youth and pleasuie'sday 
 
 Every line of this little effusion is respon- 
 sive to the address, '* To first Love;** 
 and both probably took rise from tlic cir- 
 cumstances and conversation of the mo- 
 ment; when fancy stole her inspirations 
 from the lip of love, and genius realized 
 what passion dictated : if so, how 1 envy 
 the authors ! 
 
 B 4 LETTER 
 
32 
 
 LETTER Vir. 
 
 The family of L — • — arrived here a i'cvr 
 clays back, with a crowd of company ; and 
 so htt!e do these people understand the 
 science of employnnent, or the art of giving 
 pleasure its true zest by the poignant charrn 
 of novelty, or the magical force of contrast, 
 that among the sublime and beautiful of 
 jtiature, an:iong rocks and torrents, woods 
 and mountains, they pursue the same idle 
 .routine of frivolous and insipid amusements 
 as interested and engaged them amidst the 
 smoke and din, the bustle and noise, of 
 the dissipated metropolis : thus, neglecting 
 to consult the genius of the place in every 
 
 thing, Lady L has her green-house 
 
 and aviary in Merrion Square, and her 
 billiard-room and pharo-bank in the coun- 
 try. Notwithstanding all this, I think 
 every one seems tired of the other ; they 
 yawn more in an hour than they laugh 
 in a week, and frequently recall to my 
 mind Voltaire's animated picture of Las- 
 situde and Ennui. 
 
 *' De soi iTicme peu satisfait 
 On vent dii monde, il embarnsse 
 Le plaisir fuit, le jour se passe 
 Saas scavoir ce que I'on fait." 
 
 ^ Ah J. 
 
S3 
 
 Ah ! but, my good friend, there Is some- 
 body else arrived in the country besides 
 
 Lady L and her group of automatons ! 
 
 It is Olivia, the heroine of my httle novel. 
 She appeared at a fete-champetre given by 
 
 Lady L last night. Shall I confess a 
 
 weakness, which, knowing me as you do, 
 you have probably anticipated and smiled 
 at ? Often, since I first heard of this amia- 
 ble young person, have my heart and ima- 
 gination enriched her with all those touch- 
 ing graces, those seldom met, and superior 
 endowments, with which I have so fre- 
 quently decked the " celestial visitant,'* 
 my own rapturous melancholy loves to 
 create. 1 cannot describe to you with what 
 emotions I heard her announced, and be- 
 held her enter; yet the appearance of 
 Olivia is not of that striking description to 
 iix the gaze of admiring attention amidst 
 the splendour of a ball-room, and a crowd 
 of beautiful competitors. Olivia is rather 
 bewitching than beautiful ; but there is a 
 certain artless poignancy in her air, an 
 original something, that possesses a charm 
 not to be defined : it will not strike every 
 one, but those it does will feel it sensibly. 
 Her movements are graceful beyond the 
 reach of art, for hers is the grace of senti- 
 ment rather than external attention, and is 
 in my eyes a thousand times more beau- 
 tiful than even beauty itself; it animates 
 B 5 her 
 
34 
 lier every action, but it is most eminently 
 conspicuous when she dances. A thousand 
 times, as her light form flitted by me in the 
 dance, did I feel the full force of the Spec- 
 tator's assertion, that " to be a good dan- 
 cer, it is requisite to have a good under- 
 standing," There was a soul in the dancing 
 of Olivia, that seemed even to dissipate the 
 fashionable listlessness of her tonish part- 
 ners, and a wild, native feminine vivacity 
 in her air and manner, that seemed not the 
 effect of contidcnce, but the cause of the 
 most winning ease and modest freedom : 
 yet I thought at times she appeared to lose 
 all interest in the gaiety in which, a mo- 
 ment before, she seemed to participate with 
 all her heart ; an air of abstraction stole 
 over her animated countenance, as if she 
 involuntarily retired within herself; and 
 a glance of intelligence lurked in her eye, 
 tliat slyly seemed to satirize the lively sal- 
 lies her lips dispersed to the tritiers that 
 fluttered round her ; while the tone of her 
 voice, the most touching, the most har- 
 monious I ever heard, constantly raised 
 expectation, the matter which excited its 
 powers, destroyed. I hovered so constantly 
 near her, that it was almost impossible I 
 should not attract /ler notice; more than 
 once her eye met mine, and while she 
 
 spoke to Lady L in a half-whisper, I 
 
 observed her Ladyship honoured me with 
 
 a glance, 
 
35 
 a glance, and pronounced my name sufE- 
 ciently audible for me to hear it. Do you 
 • think. I was not proud of the circumstance ? 
 Indeed [ was ! I have since pronounced my 
 name in twenty different tones. Do you 
 know I think there is magic in a name ? so 
 did Mr. Shandy. 
 
 " And ev'ry tongue that speaks 
 
 But Romeo's name, speaks heav'nly eloquence," 
 
 says the impassioned Juliet. 
 
 Olivia I is not Olivia a sweet name ? it 
 is certainly an Italian appellation, and yet 
 it is a very prevailing one among some of 
 the old Connaught families. 1 am such a 
 bashful blockhead, I could not for the soul 
 of me muster up courage to get myself in- 
 troduced to her, nor indeed did I much 
 covet a ball-room introduction to such a 
 Vk'oman as Olivia. She retired early, and 
 I followed her example, and have been 
 
 ever since thinkins: that Colonel L 
 
 must be the happiest man in the world. 
 Heigch ho ! do vou know I could find it 
 in my heart to fall in love, if I too could 
 ' meet with an Olivia. 
 
 *■' Perdiito, e, tntto il tempo 
 Che in amorc non si spende," 
 
 says Tasso ; poor Vanini * said the same, 
 
 * He was consigned to an Auto-da-fe by the Inq li- 
 sition for asserting that every hour was lest whcli 
 was not spent in love. 
 
 B 6 and 
 
36 
 
 and bnrnt in '' flames no way rnetaphori- 
 cal" tor the assertion. Should I be so for- 
 tunate as to get acquainted with this inte- 
 resfmg woman, I think it will do me all 
 the good in the world; it will promote a 
 free circulation of thought, and rouse the 
 stagnant energies of my mind. It is so 
 pleasant to meet with a being whose ideas 
 assimilate to our own 1 it is the foundation 
 of all social bliss; and if there is not some 
 coincidence of mind between Olivia and 
 your friend, the supposed intuition of sym- 
 pathy has deceived him wofully indeed. I 
 am told she is a very superior musician, 
 reads much^ and writes many such httle 
 effusions as I found in the fishing-house. 
 She loves too, and is beloved: this would 
 render our friendship singular and deli- 
 cious, and dispel at once the only danger 
 I should have to fear irom so sweet a con- 
 nexion. How unlike are the females I have 
 met with here, to the idea I have formed 
 of Olivia I they are so vapid, so tritiing, so 
 inconsequent ! Thesociety altogethermdeed 
 here is insupportable; conversation si attis 
 lowest ebb, dry common-place, and unin- 
 teresting; neither strengthened by rcticc- 
 tion, nor chastened by sentiment ; neither 
 enlivened by wit, nor enriched by literary 
 observation. As you may suppose there- 
 fore, 1 spend little time in the drawii;g- 
 
 rocm of Lady L , Being alone in :\ 
 
 crowd. 
 
37 
 
 crowd, is to me of all solitudes the most 
 frightful ; and I always prefcF a ramble 
 amidst the mountains and rocks of this 
 wild country, or a seat amidst the pictu- 
 resque ruins of a very fine abbey in the 
 neighbourhood, to the tonish garrulity of 
 her Ladyship's fashionable guests. This 
 self-retirement Pope terms the " f is oiler of 
 mankind :" it is certainly a f'ls aller with 
 me ; for I have a mind formed for society, 
 and a heart, whose every pulsation throbs 
 in unison with its pleasures and its endear- 
 ments. 
 
 LETTER Vin. 
 
 It is long, my dear friend, since a post' 
 day has been to me " a day of melody ;" 
 existence seems to suffer a degree of sus- 
 pension in the intermediate intervals ; and 
 the pleasure that thrills through my heart, 
 when I receive a letter from you, or my 
 beloved little family, and the fears, the 
 tender anxieties a disappointment occa- 
 sions, are my only proof that my feelings 
 are yet alive to the influence of bliss or 
 anguish; and that there yet throb some 
 affectionate hearts, in whom I excite, for 
 whom I feel, an interest. Were it not for 
 
 that. 
 
38 
 
 tliat, what were the life of man ? I have 
 this moment received your long- wished -for 
 letter. I am not at all surprised that yeur 
 literary acquaintance disappointed you- 
 You are amazed to find a man of genius a 
 coxcomb, and the celebrated author of 
 
 ■ , a pragmatical fellow I But prepare 
 
 yourself, my dear friend, for n^any such 
 disappointments in your journey through 
 life, if you expect to rneei with perfect 
 conformity of parts and consistency of cha- 
 racter, in the " summary and central point 
 of all existence, man." Ticho Brahe, who 
 laughed at that phenomenon * v^hich filled 
 (at that time) the world with consterna- 
 tion and dread, would yet resign himself 
 to the most desponding depression of 
 spirits, if an old woman was the first to 
 salute him in the morning, or a hare 
 crossed him at the entrance of his house. 
 The immortal Vcrulam has been charac- 
 terized as 
 
 - *' The brightest, wisest, meanest of mankind!" 
 
 James II. of England, as a brave general, 
 a dastardly monarch ; Louis XIV. the hero 
 of his age, the tool of his mistresses ; and 
 Aristotle, the prince of philosophers, and 
 who obtained as universal an empire over 
 the minds of mankind, as did his pupil 
 
 *An eclipse, 
 
 over 
 
39 
 over their lives and properties, the most 
 iinished fop in Greece. Such, my dear 
 friend, are the lights and shades of the 
 human character; hut a young mind, reared 
 in retirement and solitude, knowing the 
 world only by books, and judging of man 
 by its own virtuous bias, enters on busy 
 bustling life full of " the vulgar errors of 
 the vv'ise ;" giving to virtue, or to genius, 
 its appropriate qualifications, and, in the 
 unbridled expectations of imagination, 
 sketching a prelude for subsequent morti- 
 iications : but the glow of its pleasing de- 
 lusion soon fades in the disappointment of 
 worldly experience; and when it finds that 
 beauty has no inseparable connexion with 
 goodness, genius with virtue, talents with 
 rectitude, nor speculative philosophy with 
 moral excellence, it sighs over the ruins 
 of fond expectations, and but too often 
 exclaims, " Alas! poor human nature !'* 
 For my own part, my own disappointments 
 in this respect have been so numerous, 
 that I should not be much surprised to find 
 that this new *' dweller of my thoughts," 
 this dangerous Olivia, had not (to use a 
 term of Swift's) thrown off all the Jea-v'mgs of 
 ///tf^^"^; and that is, I assure you, the strong- 
 est proof I could give of my scepticism 
 to the perfection of our own natures. 
 
 I must thank you a thousand times for 
 your letter, and your kindness to my mo- 
 ther ; 
 
40 
 
 tlier ; but I tliink it were advisable for her 
 not to leave Switzerland until my prospects 
 clear up a little ; besides that, she can ma- 
 nage her litl'c income there, to more ad- 
 vantage than cither here or in England. 
 Ah ! my dear friend, it is this helpless little 
 family that at once attaches me to life, and 
 embitters it. 
 
 " Tile valiant in himself, what can he suffer ? 
 Or what need he legaid his single woes?" 
 
 What indeed? Let me know if you have 
 heard from our old preceptor at Geneva, 
 or any ol our school-companions; 1 found 
 many of their names written in an old 
 Corderius that had jiot amouirthc few books 
 I brought over wilti me : how many plea- 
 sant hu\ish recollections did it revive I Yet 
 alter all I doubt if the state of childhood 
 is susceptible of all the happiness ascribed 
 to it ; it is rather an exemption from evil, 
 than an actual enjoyment of happi;:ess, 
 vvhiih constitutes its chiefest blessiniz;. 
 There are many hidden sources of delight, 
 dormant at that period, wiiich enrich and 
 elevate our being in a maturer day. The 
 j)leasurcs of the imagination and the mind, 
 U)e retrospect ot past happiness, and the 
 anticipation of future, are unknown to 
 the child : he lives but for the present mo- 
 iiicnt ; and has he not in that the advantage 
 over all the philosophers of the earth ? 
 
 LETTEP. 
 
4t 
 
 LETTER IX. 
 
 1 HAVE met with an adventure. — ^Yes- 
 terday I flung my gun at my back, and 
 rambled about the mountains for some 
 time without firing a shot, until, wearied 
 by the sultiy influence of the hour, I 
 directed my steps to a little coppice, that 
 wound down the sides of a rugged steep, 
 and seemed to screen from the chill moun- 
 tain blast a cottage, whose blue curling 
 smoke rose above the plantation of fir and 
 copper-ash that sheltered it. Struck by its 
 picturesque situation, I was induced to 
 sketch it, with the surrounding scenery, 
 in the blank leaf of a book I held in my 
 hand. When, on a nearer approach, I heard 
 the confused prattle of childish voices, and 
 supposing it some little receptacle of learn- 
 ing* 
 
 " Where sits the dame disguis'd in look profound, 
 And eyes her fairy throng, and turns her wheel 
 around," 
 
 I advanced cautiously to take a glance 
 of one of those characteristic and living 
 pictures, which equally interest my heart 
 and taste; and the thin foliage of a low- 
 quickset hedge favoured the intention. 
 
 Within 
 
43 
 
 "Witliin the door of the cottage, \vith alf 
 the insignia of birch and spectacles, sat 
 the president of the little society, " stiff, 
 dry, and sage;" on either side stood a 
 weeping pupil, whose brows were encircled 
 with ihe disgraceful honours of a dunce's 
 cap, and whose inarticulate voices sobbed 
 over the immortal feats of " the Seven 
 Champions of Christendom." At a small 
 divSlance from the entrance of the hut, a 
 little group circled round a white pahng, 
 over which leaned a female form, light 
 and graceful as that of an hamadryad. A 
 veil but half drawn, discovered the pret- 
 tiest mouth and chin in the world ; and a 
 voice the most harmonious, alternately 
 dispensed encouragement and approba- 
 tion, sometimes chid and sometimes ad- 
 vised, with a sweetness that must have 
 ensured reformation in the attentive little 
 auditory to whom it was addressed. The 
 fascinating preceptress having finished her 
 examination, and exhorted them to an 
 observance of their moral, religious, and 
 fchool duties, dispensed rewards propor- 
 tioned to their merits : some got a cake, 
 some a toy, some a book, from a little 
 basket that hung on her arm : even tha 
 poor weeping dunces were not forgotten, 
 in spite of the remonstrances of their an- 
 gry instructress ; and one chubby smiliiig 
 being got a kiss into the bargain — (how I 
 
 envied 
 
43 
 
 envied the little rogue \\ She then (hanked 
 the lady-president for her great attention, 
 and departed : she was followed by a ser- 
 vant, who drove a garden chair; and as she 
 walked slowly up a steep hill, I fled from 
 my covert, and darting through a thick 
 plantation, sprung over a ditch, so as to 
 cross the path she had taken. No rzise de 
 guerre was ever better managed : I met 
 her full — it was Olivia ! Had I indulged 
 myself in the impulse of the moment, I 
 should have bent my knee to her as she 
 passed, with more animated devotion than 
 ever votarist did at the shrine of his patron 
 saint ; but I only bowed respectfully ; and 
 even that I felt presumptuous, as I had 
 not been introduced to her. To my 
 astonishment, she addressed me, with the 
 most winning ease, by my name ; and 
 
 her inquiries for the family of L formed 
 
 a kind of excuse for my walking by her 
 side, v^hich was prolonged by her noticing 
 the book I held in my hand. " Ah ! 
 Ossian," said she, with animation, turning 
 over the leaves, and reading with great 
 energy the following lines : " Often does 
 the memory of former times come like 
 the evening sun on my soul." — " Often 
 indeed !" said she expressively ; and after 
 a pause of a moment, she added, " This 
 is the poetry of the heart — and that heart 
 which is endowed with most sensibility, 
 
 will 
 
44 
 
 Will be mo?t alive to its beauties." She 
 paused, 1 believe for me to speak, bnt I 
 continued silent, and she went on (I think. 
 \vith a look of disappointnnent) : '* There is 
 indeed a nutritive enthusiasm requisite to 
 cherish a taste for Ossian, which very few 
 possess." — " And you exclude me, I fancy,'* 
 said [ with a smile, " from the number 
 of ihat elected few." — " Had such been 
 my supposition, politeness would have 
 spared t!ie observation ; but he who makes 
 a work the companion of a solitary walk, 
 cannot do it from ostentation, and he wha 
 reads Ossian from taste, cannot be a com* 
 mon many 
 
 How do you think I received the com- 
 pliment ? Do you not fancy you behold 
 me, with the colour rushing to my face, 
 pleasure dancing in my eyes, and my 
 whole frame agitated by those emotions 
 %vhich awakened delight ever produces in 
 me? So far indeed you are right; bat if 
 you imagine you hear me stammering out 
 a comphment in return, you are deceived. 
 I continued as silent as a Faquir in the 
 act of penance, and fixed my eyes on her 
 face, vvith a gaze so ardent, as to obhge 
 her in some confusion to withdraw hers, 
 and probably left it a matter of doubt with 
 her, whether I was a fool or a coxcomb, 
 or botH ; for I observed a sly smile steal 
 over licr countenance^ and she began to 
 
 talk 
 
45 
 
 talk as she did the other night in Lady 
 L 's drawing-room, adapting the con- 
 versation to the folly of her auditor. I 
 could not support this, and I abruptly 
 interrupted her, by asking what style of 
 reading she preferred ; for the soul of me, 
 I could not torture out any thing else to 
 say: she replied, " That which promotes 
 the social virtues of the heart, by delineati!5g 
 their effects in the most amiable and attrac- 
 tive light, and which is calculated to in- 
 crease those sensibilities that bind us to 
 life; but I am indeed a truly desultory 
 reader, perusing every thing I meet v^ith, 
 reading much less than I wish, and much 
 more than I ou2;ht.'' — " And can that be 
 possible ?" — " Oh ! very ! life is so brief, 
 and its duties so numerous, that a too in- 
 tense application to any one pursuit 
 (situated as I am) must eventually injure 
 another. I have a father, a grandfather, 
 who have every claim on my attention and 
 care: I have dependants who look up to 
 me for support, inferiors tor example — > 
 sacred ties ! Did [ neglect them, I should 
 be unworthy of the happiness they confer." 
 — '' Thrice happy," exclaimed I with 
 enthusiastic admiration, "are tlie obje( ts 
 who share in tiicse ?acrcd tics, and tr:ri :e 
 blest the man who shall call that bemg 
 his, so worthy of the happiness they indeed 
 only can coaici !'' — '* Xhe energy oi^ your 
 
 manner/' 
 
45 
 
 manner," said she blushing, " blinds me 
 to the flattery of your encomium, and 
 gives that an air of truth which was only 
 meant as a compliment." — " No, Madam, 
 1 am no flatterer : a flattefer is insensible 
 to reproof; and I feel sensibly the full 
 force of yours. Though not always speak- 
 ing wliat I think, I always think what I 
 speak, and the energy of my manner only 
 rises in proportion to the merit of the 
 subject which elicits it." 
 
 She bowed, and laughingly said, " To 
 accuse you of a crime, 1 see, only plunges 
 you deeper in the guilt you deny ; but I 
 fear 1 have drawn you out of your road, 
 and intruded on your time." — " Thus," 
 said I, catching her gaiety, and answering 
 her from Douglas, " to lose my hours is 
 all the use I wish to make of time." 
 
 " Nay then," said she, " I must fly in 
 my own defence." The servant then com- 
 ing up wiih the garden chair, she sprung 
 lightly into it, before I could offer her 
 my hand (though I had it in delightful 
 conteniplation), and wishing me good 
 morning, drove olf , How long I remained 
 on the spot where she left me, I know 
 not ; but the family were at dinner when 
 I got home, and tlie next morning a boy 
 came for a reward for bringing me my 
 Ossian ; how or u here I dropt it, 1 can- 
 not recollect. Nothing can be more 
 
 amiable 
 
47 
 
 •amiable than Ihe character this charming 
 woman supports, even among those who 
 are but ill calculated to form any just esti- 
 mate of a being, so every way aljove 
 their powers ot' discrimination, and the 
 ordinary level of her sex. Some rigid old 
 maids and disappointed widows accuse 
 her of volatility ; and some un-idead girls 
 and empty boys, of pedantry; but no one 
 dares to doubt the excellence of her heart, 
 or the brilliancy of her talents; and lor 
 my own part, she has given me a more 
 elevated idea of human excellence, than, 
 even in my most sanguine moments of 
 philanthropy and good- will to my fellow- 
 creaturcs, I ever dared to indulge in. Her 
 grandfather is esteemed and respected by 
 all ranks, and is the only gentleman in 
 these parts who cultivates h'ish literature, 
 or appears anxious to rescue from total 
 oblivion the poetry and mu.sic of his 
 country. He is in every respect the true 
 type of the old Irish chieftain : implacable 
 in his resentments, making decision the 
 criterion of his wisdom, and shewing equal 
 aversion to the retracting an error as a right 
 action ; generous, open, and unsuspicious, 
 even where caution might be warranted by 
 experienced imposition ; indiscriminately 
 hospitable and benevolent; and eons'.der- 
 ing himself as bound to support the wel- 
 fare and interest of his familv, even to 
 
 the 
 
48 
 
 \.he remotest member that can claim a 
 shadow of affinity to him. His house, I 
 am told, displays the profuse abundance 
 of other times, rather than the refinements 
 of modern luxury; and liis Irish manu- 
 scripts, his harper and his ruins, hold the 
 next place in his heart to his grand- 
 daughter, whom he loves to idolatry. 
 
 LETTER X. 
 
 Yesterday, thinking of nothing more 
 than Olivia, tliinking of nothing less than 
 beholding her, 1 entered the drawing-room 
 abruptly, and found her there alone. 
 Imagine my confusion — but it vanished 
 when she addressed me. This woman has 
 the power, beyond all I ever met, of con- 
 ferring that ease on others which so emi- 
 nently characterizes her own manners. In 
 a moment I was seated by her on the 
 couch, and listening to her complaints of 
 
 di.'^appointment at not finding Lady L 
 
 at home. " And here," said she, taking up a 
 book s!)e had flung down at my entrance, 
 " 1 hail forgot her Ladyship and myself 
 over a volume of Marmontel. In works of 
 taste and fancy thrre is a tenderness, an 
 animation, in the Frencli style, that hur- 
 ries 
 
49 
 
 ries away the heart and irnagination, even 
 when unsar>ctioned by the judgment; and 
 this sorcery of style, though certauily noit 
 hidigenous to the sterner soil of British 
 hterature, is rapidly engrafting itscif upon 
 its stronger productions." — ^" I have found 
 the accuracy of your remark," said I, " irt 
 the style of many English works which I 
 have read since my arrival in this country; 
 though Lord Roscommon, in his cele- 
 brated critique on the two styles, almost 
 bids defiance to their amalgamation ; and 
 though it is certain that the English do 
 retain the * sterling bullion,' yet we must 
 not deny that the French possess the power 
 of enriching the republic of letters, by 
 working it to the greatest advantage ; we 
 are also indebted to them for that style 
 of novel- writing which, to the destruction 
 of romance, distinguishes the present day." 
 
 *' Yes," said Olivia, " it is to the pen 
 of Madame la Fayette, more powerful 
 than the wand of Urganda, that we owe 
 the annihilation of giants and dwarfs, ter- 
 rific heroes and supernatural heroines." 
 
 *' And it was for a woman only," said 
 J, smiling, " to vindicate the feelings of 
 the heart ; for it is the tender and subtle 
 fancy pf a woman only that can enter 
 into all the delicate minutiae of its emo- 
 tions." 
 
 c " And 
 
50 
 
 *' And yet," said Olivia, archly, " you 
 men consider the minds of women, as the 
 Swiss do their gold-mines in La Valais, 
 which the public good will not suffer to 
 be opened." 
 
 ** And with reason," said I. '' Self-pre- 
 servation is the most indelible law of na- 
 ture, and instinctively teaches us to weaken 
 those powers which, even in their most 
 debilitated state, are but too dangerous. 
 For my own part, a learned attack from the 
 whole college of the Sorbonne would be 
 less formidable to me, than one touching 
 sentiment from the lips of a lovely wo- 
 man." Here the entrance of Lady 
 
 L put an end to our conversation, 
 
 and I was delighted to observe that Olivia 
 ineffectually struggled to bear a part in 
 the detail of flippant nothings which al- 
 ways constitute her Ladyship's discourse. 
 I left the room iminediately, but by linger- 
 ing about the lawn till Olivia's carriage 
 was ordered, I obtained a bow and a smile 
 as she passed me. 
 
 And of what consequence was it to me 
 that she bowed and smiled ? — she did so 
 the next moment to a peasant who saluted 
 her. But, heavens and earth ! there arc 
 as many various characters in a bow and 
 smile as in the Chinese language : how I 
 hated them both at the levee of a minister 
 
 of 
 
5^ 
 of state : but oppose the seraph smile of 
 Olivia to the sycophantic leer of a hack- 
 neyed placeman, and fill up the interme- 
 diate degrees if you can. 
 
 My mother's silence tills me with a 
 thousand alarms. Lord Bolingbroke terms 
 suspense " the only insupportable misfor- 
 tune in life," and it is certainly the one 
 above all others I can bear with least pa- 
 tience or fortitude! If Monsieur Soutumont 
 wrote to you, he probably mentioned my 
 little family : pray let me know, and write 
 soon. 
 
 LETTER XL 
 
 You have often faid to me, my dear 
 friend, when chiding me for some little 
 extravagance of sentiments, or conduct, 
 "There is a romanticindependence of mind 
 about you almost savage ; for I doubt if 
 you will ever submit to the subjection of 
 those subordinations which reason sanc- 
 tions for the well-being of society, and 
 from which the truest independence flows." 
 But the fact is, I can wear my chains as 
 light and as willing as another, provided 
 they are self-imposed ; and then 1 wnnd 
 them round me with an ease and grace 
 that renders me insensible to their restric- 
 c 2 tion. 
 
52 
 
 tion. I undertook the education of my 
 little cousins with pleasure, and pursued 
 the task with increasing interest, until 
 what I meant to confer as an obligation, 
 evidently became a duty ; and from that 
 moment, weariness and reluctance have 
 marked the pursuit. These narrow-minded 
 people defeat their own interest, by the 
 greedy and over-reaching avarice with 
 which they urge its promotion. Education 
 is always the snare which parental anxiety, 
 ungoverned by reason, lays lo entrap pos- 
 sibility and common sense. These peo- 
 ple weary me by their importunities, their 
 caprice, and their objections : my Lord 
 thinks wisdom should be taught as religion 
 was heretofore, by stripes ; and my Lady, 
 whom nature never burdened with one 
 original idea, supposes that all intellectual 
 information should be " governed by a 
 clock." You who know how I was edu- 
 cated by my father, who levied, 
 
 " With an easy sway, 
 
 A tax of profit from my very play;" 
 
 whose system of education, though per- 
 fect, was never obvious, and who stole 
 me into improvement, under all the at- 
 tractions of pleasure ; you will judge how 
 inimical my sentiments are on this head 
 to those common place idras of these peo- 
 ple : what is worse, ihey deliver their opi- 
 nions 
 
53 
 nions with an air so imposing, as almost 
 forces me to feel myself the thing tliey 
 would make me ; so true it is, that even 
 the freedom of agency may be limited by 
 situation, and liberality of sentiment and 
 stability of principle weakened, if not de- 
 stroyed, by a long and close association 
 with narrow, vulgar, and illiberal minds. 
 I at iirst seized upon this employment, as 
 the most efficacious antidote against that 
 lassitude and dejection, which my wound- 
 ed spirits and the nervous affection of my 
 constitution had produced, as well as the 
 means of liberating me from the shackles 
 of dependance. " For it is certain," says 
 Zimmerman, "that the moment we resolve 
 not to be idle, and to bear our sufferings 
 with patience, the anguish of our souls 
 abates ;" and mine were no common feel- 
 ings. 1 had just lost a father — such a fa- 
 ther ! I had left a mother declining in 
 health and years, and an unprotected sister, 
 who looked up to me for that support I 
 can only obtain by the precarious exer- 
 tions of a man I despise. I doubt too, if 
 the impatience of my temper, and that ir- 
 ritable independL^nce of spirit, which still 
 stubbornly resist the chilling principles of 
 prudence and interest, will suffer me to 
 wait on the tardy operations of a man, vv'ho 
 can only be stimulated to immediate and 
 active exertion, by self-interest or pride; 
 c 3 and 
 
54 
 
 and who, by retaining me in a state of in- 
 dependence, can gratify at once these 
 two leading principles of his nature. There 
 are, I believe, many such characters in the 
 world, who make interest the grand pivot 
 on which every action turns ; but this day 
 introduced me to a man, who has for the 
 moment put me in humour with the world, 
 and, what is more, with myself. Sir Pa- 
 trick Desmond made one at a large din- . 
 iier-party here to-day, from which female 
 ^iocicty was excluded; and consequently 
 his charming grand- daughter did not ac- 
 company him : however, as neither Flo- 
 ratian elegance, nor Attic delicacy, render- 
 ed the entertainment the " feast of reason 
 and the flow of soul,'* the ladies lost little 
 by a prohibition, which only excluded 
 them from a conversation, of which horses 
 and dogs formed the chief topic. There is 
 more point of manner and character of 
 appearance in this old chieftain, than ever 
 I beheld united in one person : his tall 
 figure, rising even to majesty, bends gently 
 forward, ratlicr apparently from the effects 
 of recent illness, than old age; and the 
 glow tiiat still barns on his cheek, seems 
 to owe its warmth to the vivacity of his 
 mmd, rather than the strength of his con- 
 stitution. He speaks of his country, as if 
 he loved it wuii the idolatrous fondness 
 of a primitive Roman ; and in a broad 
 
 provincial 
 
55 
 provincial accent, and that curious felicity 
 of expression he has borrowed from its 
 original tongue, makes its language, music, 
 and antiquities, the almost constant subject 
 of his conversation : and as no one seemed 
 anxious but myself, to participate in such 
 a conversation, he seemed flattered by my 
 curiosity and attention. When I was as- 
 sisting him to his carriage, he spoke of 
 my father, whom he had known intimate- 
 ly, as the fondest sor^ would wish to hear 
 a father spoken of; and gave me a very 
 cordial and pressing invitation to the 
 Abbey : on the latter I shall make no 
 comment. 
 
 LETTER Xir. ^.f, 
 
 " Et je touchais ^ ces moments, 
 Trop courtes de mon bonheur." 
 
 There are perhap"? in the life of every 
 sensient being, certain moments which 
 memory never rehnquishes, and which 
 survive the recollection of more recent 
 periods and more important hours : such 
 are those which I have this day passed 
 with Olivia and her grandfather. 
 
 Sir Patrick Desmond breakfasted here 
 
 in the morning, and insisted on taking me 
 
 • c 4 home 
 
5« 
 home with him, to shew me the ruins of 
 a castle, erected by one of the Hynialls 
 (the Agamcmnons and Achilleses of lre» 
 Jand), and a Druidical Cromlech, both oa 
 his estate. The old Baronet has treasured 
 rich hoard of traditional anecdotes, which 
 he takes pride in displaying ; and seemed 
 not a little flattered by the attention and 
 curiosity his recitals awakened in the 
 mind of his auditor. We both displayed 
 as much warmth in fixing the native place 
 of Ossian, as the commentators of Ho- 
 rner, the spot which had the honour of 
 giving him birth. Every mountain in the 
 province was enriched by a feat of Fin* 
 gal; not an old woman in the country, 
 but could recite a poem of his inspired 
 son ; and he pointed to a promontory, 
 which distance almost reduced to a sha- 
 dioW) the extreme point of which is still 
 called the Seat of Fingal (of whom the 
 lower order of Irish repeat many impro- 
 bable tales). To all these demonstrative 
 proofs, I could only recapitulate the opi- 
 nions of Blair, the arguments of Home, 
 find the sentiments ot Gibbon ; and we 
 both arrived at Desmond Abbey, in the 
 same mind with respect to Ossian as we set 
 out. We were still skirmishing when we 
 entered the drawing-room, where we 
 found Olivia. 1 wish you could have seen 
 the animj^tcd manner in which she received 
 
 me; 
 
'57 
 
 me ; the air, at once tender and playful, 
 with which she chid her grandfather for 
 venturing out so early, while still an in- 
 valid. She is full of graces ! She was 
 playing the harp when we entered ; and at 
 my very earnest request, resumed her seat 
 at the instrument. " Your ear, I suppose, 
 Mr. St. Clair," said the Baronet, " is made 
 up to the delicacies of foreign music; 
 and indeed, I believe Livy is the only girl 
 in the kingdom who has the courage to 
 oppose national taste to fashionable pre- 
 judices." 
 
 " The Irish music," said I, *' is, in my 
 opinion, calculated to harmonize with 
 every feeling of the soul ; it is the music 
 of sentiment and passion ; and that is the 
 true music of the heart." 
 
 *' Then we will have Emuinch Rc7niic^'* 
 said the Baronet, with a smile. Olivia tu- 
 ned her harp ; and after a prelude, in which 
 she displayed an execution, bold, various, 
 and correct, struck a few low chords, and 
 sung the air, first to the original Irish 
 words, and then to a translation of her 
 own. You know my sensibility, my rap- 
 turous enthusiasm with respect to music. 
 Iwas sensibly affected ; the air, so wild, so 
 plaintive, the melancholy simplicity of its 
 expression, the sensibility to its powers, 
 which trembled in the melodious tones of 
 the enchanting songstress, all powerfully 
 c 5 affected 
 
58 
 affected me ; and my emotion increased, 
 as I read the reflection of my feelings, 
 in the divinely touching countenance of 
 Olivia : it seemed a stimulus to her de- 
 lightful exertions, and she appeared to 
 draw inspiration from the admiration she 
 had excited. Her last verse was the best ; 
 and her voice, as it died over the faint 
 vibration of the chords, had all the heart- 
 breaking melancholy softness of the Eolian 
 lyre. She ceased, and I remained silent 
 and overwhelmed, till roused by the 
 Baronet's hearty laugh of gratified pa- 
 rental and national pride : and Olivia 
 gaily said, " Your musical sensibility is so 
 much alive, JMr. St. Clair, that if I had a 
 mi!id to banish my welcome guest, I 
 should play the ' Renzt de Seiche*,' at 
 this moment with success." I could not 
 help telling her, and with a look 1 believe 
 that ratified the assertion, " that there 
 lurked a spell in her voice, to counteract 
 the magic of its n:usic ; and that I should 
 find it less ditficuit to resist the influence 
 ot the song, than the attraction of the 
 songstress." 
 
 The hours fled, I cannot describe how ; 
 but 1 still feel as if but just awakened 
 
 * Forbidden to be played among the Swiss sol- 
 diers in ihe French strvice, as it aunkened a longing 
 lecolleciion o: their ccuntry, and caused desertion. 
 
 from 
 
• 59 
 from a delightful impression of a blissful 
 dream ; and this one day saves me from 
 the apprehension of 
 
 " Mourant sans avoir vecu." 
 
 The L family had supped before I 
 
 returned. Never did their society appear 
 to me so cold, so vapid, so uninteresting. 
 Have yon ever felt the chilling transition 
 of leaving the society to which intellect 
 and sympathy had attached you, for that 
 in which you felt yourself isolated and 
 unconnected ? It is, in my opinion, one of 
 the most painful sensations to which the 
 human mind is liable. Bat the remem- 
 brance of Olivia soon drove away every 
 reflection less delightful ; her dangerous 
 little attentions, her animated air, her 
 seducing manners, her mubic, her conver- 
 sation, were present to me the whole 
 night. It is not love, it is not passion, 
 this woman is capable of exciting ; it is de- 
 lirium ! The dream may be transient ; but 
 were I the elected object of her choice, 
 (merciful Heavens ! ) 1 would not resign 
 that dream, for all the realities of a vaoid 
 eternity. 
 
 It is now an hour past midnight, and 
 
 I am jjoinc;; to read " Werter." J had 
 
 almost forgot to teli you, Olivia lent it to 
 
 me J and the passages marked by her pen- 
 
 c 6 cil^ 
 
6o 
 
 ell, give me the most flattering conviction 
 of the coincidence of our opinions and 
 the congeniahty of our tastes. 
 
 LETTER XIII. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 It has been said, that every author has 
 the heel of Achilles ; and the enclosed 
 little poem will teach you where to apply 
 the assertion in its fullest force. In fact, 
 I do not wish to deny, that I was highly 
 gratified by your approbation ; for to be 
 insensible to applause is the first step to- 
 Vv'ards being careless of deserving it. The 
 singular and plaintive beauty of the air 
 of" Emuinch Ecnu'ic^'' which, replete with 
 the characteristic wildness and melting 
 pathos of the Irish music, may be deemed 
 an epitome of Irish composition, induced 
 me to attempt an adaptation of English 
 words to its melody; and the ideas I had 
 treasured of the old Irish fragment of that 
 name, and which I had learnt from my 
 father in my earliest childhood, though 
 they gave me some assistance, were not 
 sufficient to ensure me success in the un- 
 dertaking ; for the music and poetry of 
 
 the 
 
6t 
 
 the Irish are so closely analogous, and the 
 sound so faithful an echo to the sense, that 
 the former seems to bid dctiance to the 
 adaptation of any other language to its me- 
 lody ; and the latter must always sustain 
 an injury, in its energetic and idiomatic 
 delicacies, when given through the me- 
 dium of a translation. The following at- 
 tempt, therefore, which I submit to your 
 judgment, is but a very faint type of the 
 original, which abounds in the most cu- 
 rious felicity of expression and exquisite 
 simplicity of thought. My grandfather, 
 who is anxious to put my little poetical 
 fugitive into your hands, will have the 
 pleasure to deliver you this ; and you will 
 do me the favour to send me back Werter 
 (if you have finished its perusal) by the 
 servant. 
 
 EMUINCH ECNUIC; 
 
 OR, 
 ■* NED OF THE HILLS*. 
 
 I. 
 
 " Ah ! who is that, whose thrilling tones 
 
 Still put my tranquil sleep astray 
 (More plaintive than the wood -doves' moans), 
 
 And sends ray airy dreanis away ?" 
 
 * The hero of this, and many other national ballads, 
 was the chief or captain of one of those numerous ban- 
 ditties which infested Ireland during that period when 
 
 religious- 
 
62 
 
 II. 
 
 «' 'T is I, 't is Edmund of rhe hills, 
 Who puts thy trdiiquil bler-p a>tray ; 
 
 Who.sr piaintivtr bong o. sorrow thrills, 
 And bends thy airy dreams away. 
 
 *' Here nightly, through the long, long year, 
 IN. y heart with many a love-pang wrung, 
 
 Beneath thy casement, Eva dear, 
 
 My sorrows and thy charms 1 've sung. 
 
 " Thine eye is like the morn's soft gray. 
 Tinted with ev'ning'b azure blue; 
 
 Its first glance stole my soul away, 
 And gave its every wish to you. 
 
 " Like a soft gloomy cloud 's thine hair, 
 Ting'd with the setting sun's warm rays. 
 
 And lightly o'er thy toreuead fair 
 In many a spiry ringlet plays. 
 
 religious animosity and civil discord involved its unfor- 
 tunate natives in all the nortors of anarchy and warfare. 
 The accounts which are given of Emulmh Eaiuic are 
 various and improbable ; but that most current, and 
 most consonant to truth, sketches him as an outlawed 
 gentleman, whose confiscated lands and turfeiied life 
 animated him to the desperate resoiution of heading a 
 band of robbers, and committing many act.s of despe- 
 ration ; which were frequently counteiadcu by a gene- 
 rosity almost romantic, or supponeu by a spirit almost 
 heroic. A warrior and a poet, l.ib sou uas •' often 
 brightened by the song;" and Eva, ttit daughter of a 
 norihern chieftain, was at once his inspiration and his 
 theme, 
 
 VI. 
 
63 
 
 *' Oh ! come then, rich in all thy charms; 
 
 For, Eva, I 'm as rich in iove ; 
 And panting in my circling arms, 
 
 I '11 bear thee to old Thuar's * grove." 
 
 LETTER XIV. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 T MUST thank you, Madam, a thousand 
 tunes for this new mark of your attention, 
 so grateful to my heart, and so flattering 
 to my taste ; for to be supposed to have a 
 taste for genius may certainly be ranked 
 next to its actual possession ; but J shall 
 not say a word of the merit of your little 
 poem; it has already excited a tribute of 
 admiration more Jiaif and animated, than 
 in a cooler moment, when neither borne 
 away by the sorcery of your song, or the 
 charm of jour voice, it could extort. It is 
 certain that 
 
 " L*oreiUe est le chemin du coeur." 
 
 And though my mind may be more sus- 
 ceptible of the excellence of your poetry as 
 
 * A mountain in Ulster, county of Armagh. 
 
 I read 
 
64 
 
 I read it, yet I confess my heart was more 
 touched by its recitation from hps which 
 
 *' Not by words pleas'd only ;'* 
 
 however, it was written by your hand, and 
 that alone is sufficient to raise it in my 
 opmion, above the most sacred rchc that 
 ever decked the shrine of Loretto. 
 
 I am sorry that you have exacted obe- 
 dience on the only point on which 1 would 
 not most devoutly pay it : 1 cannot send 
 you Werter by the servant — it v\ou!d be 
 profanation ; besides, it will serve as an 
 excuse for my intrusion at the Abbey 
 sooner than I intended. I shall then have 
 the pleasure of returning Werter into, 
 perhaps, the only hands worthy of him ; 
 and even in doing this I shall give no small 
 proof of self-denial. It is true I may have 
 another^ but that other will not be Werter. 
 •^The strokes of the pencil guide and con- 
 firm my taste. I feel an ineffable pleasure 
 in thus finding a coincidence in our senti- 
 ments. I imagine myself seated by the 
 charming owner of this book; I hear her 
 touching voice express with truth and deli- 
 cacy the emotion its perusal excites, as 
 when she recommended it to me the other 
 evening ; I almost think she addresses me 
 in the language of Werter, " It is most 
 certain, that what renders one person 
 3 more 
 
«5 
 
 more necessary to another, is a similarity 
 of taste and sentiment." 1 am not ashamed 
 to confess myself the slave of imagination. 
 Deprive man of the joys that flow from 
 that source, and you " make him poor 
 indeed." The unfeeling, the sordid, are 
 sufficiently punished in being excluded 
 from a participation of those pleasures 
 which elevate us in the scale of thinking 
 beings. 
 
 I feel a certain depression of spirits from 
 reading Goethe, which communicates a 
 sensation to my mind, not perhaps unlike 
 the *'joy of grief," so frequently mentioned 
 by Homer, and your favourite Ossian. Is 
 it from the contagious melancholy of the 
 book, or some other cause ? — I know 
 not, nor dare I analyze my feelings. But 
 why tease you with an insipid history of 
 my sensations ? — I have already to apolo- 
 gize for my intrusion on your time and 
 patience, and yet I am going to make a 
 still greater demand on both ; — your poem 
 has tempted me to '' string my lyre vAtb 
 emulatwg vigour^' and 1 have the courage 
 to submit to your perusal the effects 
 your inspiration (and yours only) has 
 produced. 
 
 ODE 
 
66 
 
 ODE 
 
 TO FANCY. 
 
 Oh thou ! who erst with glowing fingers wreath'd 
 Around my youthful brow thy blooniiest flow'rs, 
 
 Respiiing odours of the wildest sweets, and breath'd 
 Thy frolic spirit o'er my youthful hours j 
 
 II. 
 
 Mistress of bland illusions ! where f<rt thou ? 
 
 And whither are thy soft enchantments fled ? 
 Why droops thy wreath around my youthful brow ? 
 
 Its sweets exhausted, aiul its beauties dead ? 
 
 in. 
 
 Why fade thy gloM'ing visions on my view ? 
 
 Where is thy potent spell to cheer the heart? 
 Why change thy rainbow tints to sablest hue ? 
 
 Ah J H'iiere (sweet sorc'ress), thy life-giving art? 
 
 IV, 
 
 Oh ! come, but come not as thon late were wont, 
 Wi.h faded Lilush and matted locks unb und, 
 
 Chafing my footsteps in each dreary haunt, 
 
 And scattering rue and deadly nightly-shade round i 
 
 But come, with orient blush and sunny tress, 
 The tear of transport gleaming in thine eye; 
 
 Thy lips, where revels many a fond caress, 
 Thy rosy lips exhaling rapture's sigh. 
 
 YI, 
 
67 
 
 vr. 
 
 Thy glance reviving every faded flower, 
 
 The young loves lurking in thy laughing train ; 
 
 While many a fairy joy and smiling hour 
 
 Chase the dark withered crones, Despair and Pain, 
 
 vir. 
 
 Oh ! then return, fair queen of visions gay, 
 And wrap me in thy wild delusive dream ; 
 
 Melt my froze spirits with thy genial ray, 
 
 And tinge life's gathering cloud with one blight beaiiKi 
 
 LETTER XV. 
 
 You are certainly an admirable preacher 
 of two-and twenty ; and follow up your 
 subject through all its ramifications, con- 
 sequences, and ettfcts, with the logical 
 accuracy of a profound dialectician: but 
 ** there is a time for all things" las we 
 find in Holy Writ), and unfortunately your 
 letter rcacned me in that critical period, 
 which, of all the cycles in the calendar, 
 was positively the very worst for its recep- 
 tion. In short, I was in the act of reading 
 a letter from Olivia; notwithstandmg, 
 however, I perused yours with the most 
 reverential respect for the sage head which 
 dictated it, and which certamly was drop- 
 ped in a mistake by some of nature's 
 
 clumsy 
 
68 
 
 clumsy workmen on the shoulders of the 
 gayest hearted young fellow in the world 
 — instead of being quietly placed upon the 
 neck of an Indian Bramin, a Chinese 
 Mandarin, or a saint of the Carthusian 
 order. The fact is, I believe you do antici- 
 pate your canonization by a century, and 
 have already chosen your place in the 
 Album Sanctorum of seU-denying spirits. 
 For my own part, when I seek my apo- 
 theosis, let me find it in the eyes of such a 
 ■woman as Olivia ; and then, by the finger 
 of St. Maxima (who, by the by, was one of 
 the prettiest little saints that ever gaced 
 the calendar), I would not envy ihc jfirsf 
 on the list of martyrology. 
 
 Seriously, however, have no fears for 
 me, I have often said to you, that I stood 
 halfway between Shaftesbury and Hobbes ; 
 neither thinking so well of human nature 
 as the former, nor so badly as the latter; 
 but I believe that every human being has 
 a certain measure of reason bestowed on 
 him, which, if not obstructed by the pre- 
 judices of education, or debilitated in defi- 
 ciency of exertion, is sufficient to guide its 
 possessor in that path which Providence 
 has destined him to walk through life. 
 You know that hitherto 1 have not " wrapt 
 my talent up in a napkin," and the argu- 
 ments with which the solicitude of friend- 
 ship has furnished you, arise rather from 
 
 your 
 
69 
 
 your affectionate fears than from your ex- 
 perience of my frailty, in a situation almost 
 similar. How you applauded the mastery 
 I obtained over ray first love — my passion 
 for my sweet pensive Languedocian nun ! 
 yet you tremble for the cold Platonic con- 
 nexion 1 am forming with Olivia — the 
 tender, faithful mistress of another. Jn 
 any other light 1 have never dared, per- 
 haps never wished, to consider her: but 
 because I am not to encourage one senti- 
 ment, am I therefore to be excluded from 
 the indulgence of every other? J would 
 aspire to the happiness of Olivia's friend- 
 ship, and in obtaining that I should be in- 
 sensible to the deficiency of a more tender 
 tie. But you will ask me if I can long 
 support such an intercourse with impu- 
 nity, or if I am such a Xenocrates in 
 friendship and in love, as to be capable 
 of discerning the almost imperceptible line 
 which divides them, where the object of 
 the former is possessed of every attraction 
 to excite the latter. It is true, I am not 
 much conversant in the doctrn-.e of the 
 modirtcation of ihe passions, and I am but 
 too subject to be borne away by their im- 
 petuous influence, to be able to pause on 
 their nature and attributes ; but of this I 
 am certain, not only from internal con- 
 viction but self-bought experience, that a 
 tendency to love, when opposed in its 
 
 earliest 
 
70 
 
 earliest progress by reason and impossibi- 
 lity, may be moderated into a sentiment, 
 calm yet elevated ; which may interest the 
 heart, without intoxicating the senses ; 
 which may engage the mind, without ab- 
 sorbing the faculties. No more, therefore, 
 my dear friend, of your warnings and ap- 
 prehensions ; for whatever may be the re- 
 sult of my conduct, I feel that I am in- 
 fluenced in it by an impulse stronger in- 
 £nitely than my power to resist, or your 
 argument to oppose it. 
 
 J send you a copy of Olivia's letter, and 
 a little poem that accompanied it; but for 
 the letter itself, I would not part with it, 
 though the Jesuits of Lyons were to give 
 me their voluminous Chinese history, 
 written in the Chinese character, in ex- 
 change. 
 
 Adieu, my young philosopher ; I too 
 am going to philosophize — but it is ac- 
 cording to Montaigne's system, who makes 
 enjoyment the primary principle of true 
 philosophy. We all dine at the Abbey to- 
 day — I fhall certainly put your letter in 
 my pocket, lest danger should press too 
 closely on me, and 1 shall oppose your 
 phalanx of arguments to the least of Oli- 
 via's smiles. 1 almost envy you so sweet an 
 antagonist. 
 
 LETTER 
 
71 
 
 LETTER XVI. 
 
 The scenery which surrounds Desmond 
 Abbey, and the views it commands, are 
 bold, various, and picturesque : several 
 noble ruins, where 
 
 " Many a saint and many a hero trod," 
 
 give them a moral interest; and taste seems 
 to have guided the hand of time in dispos- 
 ing of those 
 
 " Bold feudal forms 
 
 That fancy loves to gaze on." 
 
 They have awakened the imitative and 
 latent talent that is was once my delight 
 to cultivate : I fly from the restraint of a 
 school-room, the common-place topics of 
 my Lord's drinking-table, and my Lady's 
 drawing-room, where, in the words of 
 Voltaire, 
 
 " On fait tristement grand chere 
 
 Sans dire — et sans ecouter rien, 
 Tandis qvie I'hL-bete vulgaire 
 Vons assiege — Vous considere 
 
 Et croit voir le souverain bien." 
 
 I fly to ti'c environs of Desmond Abbey, 
 and, amidst the " redundance of its fune- 
 ral shades," resign myself to thai soft and 
 delicious melancholy to which the tone of 
 my mind and feelings is best adapted. 
 
 Sometimes 
 
Sometimes the result of my rambles Is a 
 tribute to the local afffection and national 
 pride of the worthy owner of these pic- 
 turesque scenes; by whom, and by his 
 charming grand daughter, I am some- 
 times caught seated on' the fragment of a 
 rock, with my port-folio on my knees. 
 Jvlothing can be more acceptable to Sir 
 Patrick than these little sketches ; nothing 
 can be more grateful to me than the 
 tasteful critiques and smiles of approbation 
 they extort from Olivia. I generally ac-- 
 company them back to the tea-table, to 
 which a pressing invitation is never want- 
 ing ; and to confess the truth, since I have 
 found this to be the case, I frequently 
 contrive to fix myself in the path they are 
 most likely to take in their evening walk. 
 This certainly gives a sameness to my 
 views ; but I strive to make up for want 
 of variety by unusual accuracy of style 
 and glow of colouring. By the pleasant 
 association of ideas this circumstance pro- 
 duces, the declining sun is to me the 
 most grateful object in the creation ; and 
 when his departing rays tinge the moun- 
 tains with purple and gold, and the win- 
 dows of the Abbey are illumined with his 
 beams, adieu to cares, languor, and anxi- 
 ety ; the bird, whose lively carol is awak- 
 ened by his renovating light, is not more 
 
7S 
 *ay, more liorht-bcarted, than T am as I 
 watch the departure of his glories. 
 
 Yesterday evening 1 met Olivia and her 
 grandfather walking, and returned to the 
 Abbey with them. After tea, when the old 
 gentleman was at chess wilh the parson, 
 who dropt in, and I was Ic-aning on the 
 back of Olivia's chair at the piano- forte, 
 the picture of ray lovely and once beloved 
 nun slipped from the riband with which it 
 was fastened round my neck, and fell at 
 Olivia's feet. Before I had time to pick it 
 up she had done so : as it is drawn in the 
 habit of the order, Olivia almost started 
 as she gazed on it ; I thought too she 
 changed colour: after a moment's silence 
 she turned round, and with a smile, arch 
 beyond all conception, said, " If the 
 fervour of your devotion rises in proportion 
 to the beauty of your tutelar saint, I pro- 
 nounce you to be as worthy of the triple 
 crown as any candidate that ever sent a 
 lonjiintr sisjh from the conclave to the 
 Vatican: — here, indeed, is the ' beauty of 
 * holiness;' and surely truths divine must 
 have come mended from those lips. Beau- 
 tiful lips ! if you could articulate, what 
 strange instances of enthusiastic piety might 
 you not relate !" — " And you, my sly 
 apostrophizing friend, look as it you would 
 evocate the patron deity to betray her vo- 
 tarist 'i'o confess the truth, however, like 
 J) 
 
.74 
 
 many other capricious devotees, who, in a 
 fit of pettish ncss, discard their saints, I 
 have given mine, long since, her coiigee ; 
 and in the interreirnum of conscience offer 
 up a promiscuous prayer, and light my 
 taper at every shrine I meet ; and 1 have 
 long worn this little Agnus Del rather from 
 liabit, tlian conviction of its infallibility.'* 
 
 OHvia looked at me doubtingiy, and 
 said, " As love sometimes borrows the lan- 
 guage of devotion, and devotion some- 
 times that of love, why may not the ob- 
 jects be also cotnmutable ?" 
 
 " This was exactly, my fair inquisitor, 
 the case in point ; my saint vjas my mis- 
 tress — but the frigid perfection of the one 
 chilled the ardour the other inspired ; and 
 as my reverence increased for the devotee, 
 my passion diminished for the woman, 
 \uitil love, weary of the cowl and scapular, 
 extinguished his torch at the shrine of reli- 
 gion." — " Now I love this open-hearted 
 ingenuity from my soul," said Olivia, with 
 naiveie ; " but there still lingers a spark 
 m the eye ot" this fair nun to work a greater 
 miracle than all the consecrated relics in 
 her convent : perhaps, too, she was the 
 object of your first love!" — " She was; 
 but the shock was electric, lively, and 
 transient." — " Then you do not place im- 
 plicit faith in the infallibility of first 
 love ?" — " On the contrary, I am a perfect 
 
 infidel." 
 
16 
 
 infidel."—" Upon what principle?"-— 
 *•' Upon one which I have gathered from 
 experience. Passion, in the youthful heart, 
 before the character is untblded, or its 
 sensibilities matured, may be considered 
 as a simple sensation of nature, unenriched 
 by those superadded ideas which constitute 
 its purer and more elevated charms. Other 
 sentiments mingle with love, as inferior 
 metals amalgamate with gold : the blan- 
 dishments of the imagination, the graces 
 of intellectual excellence, theexaggeratii)n3 
 of tancy glowing with poetical images, 
 and the refinement of taste to apply them 
 to the object beloved ; all these taculties 
 heighten and sublimate our tenderness ; 
 and, while they increase its influence, give 
 it a permanency to v^'hich the vague and 
 indefinite desires of the first dawn of the 
 passions in early life are inimical. But 
 why talk to you on the subject ? — One line 
 from the little sonnet, ' To first Love,' on 
 the window of the lishing-house, w^ould 
 overthrow all I have been impiously ad- 
 vancing against its omnipotence.'' 
 
 Olivia had listened to me with an ani- 
 mated, yet profound attention; but at 
 my last observation she raised her eyes 
 to mine, blushed, grew pale, blushed 
 again, and turning round to the instru- 
 ment, struck a few low notes, and seemed 
 insensibly to fall into a reverie. It is al- 
 D 2 most 
 
76 
 
 most a solecism to say (and yet it is ad- 
 missible too), that the soul which appears 
 in the looks and air of this woman, is a 
 stronj]^ proof in favour of materialism ; 
 for, like the mistress of Sucklintr, *' one 
 might almost say her body thought." In 
 the course of the evening she took occasion 
 to ask mc, when I had seen the lishing- 
 liouse ; and when I told her with what 
 seLitin>ents 1 had made a pilgrimage to her 
 litti-' Sarila Casa, and that my esteem and 
 admiration tor her were almost intuitive, 
 she gave me her hand, and, with an en- 
 dearing smile, said, " 1 nmst not disap- 
 point you — you could almost flatter me 
 into excellence." 
 
 I did not intend to have mentioned 
 Olivia to you, this month ; yet here slie 
 ic a full-length portrait. Well, after all, 
 let us say, with the apostle, " We trust we 
 liavc a good conscience ;" but lest you 
 should suspect / have none, I will bid 
 you Adieu. 
 
 LETTER XVIII. 
 
 Rejoick with me, my dear friend. I 
 am wriiing to you from mv Alhambra, 
 my carliilv raradisc. I am ihc guest of 
 
 Sir 
 
77 
 
 Sir Patrick Desmond — -of Olivia; and 
 three whole delicious weeks are allotted 
 me to claim that title, which I would not 
 exchan<re for that of the Dalai Lama of 
 Great Thibet. The Colonel has put off 
 his journey to Ireland for some weeks ; in 
 consequence of which, Lord and Lady 
 
 L , with all their family, are gone to 
 
 pay a visit to her Ladyship's father. 1 was 
 not even asked to accompany them ; and 
 1 was hugging myself in the expected 
 emancipation irom my chains, when Sir 
 Patrick Desmond, who learnt the circum- 
 stance (how, I know not), came himself 
 with an invitation, as cordial as it was 
 welcome ; and I accompanied him hither, 
 with an heart as willing as " bondage ere 
 to freedom ;" but not before my Lady had 
 remarked to me, that she was happy I had 
 made myself so agreeable to the old gen- 
 tleman by my talents, for he was much 
 flattered by the views I had taken of his 
 place ; that she did not doubt but he might 
 serve me materially ; and that I was right 
 always to have my own interest in view." 
 My Lord was, no doubt, of the same opi- 
 nion ; and these people, who were evi- 
 dently at a loss in what manner to ac- 
 count for this worthy man's predilection 
 in my favour, by revolving every circum- 
 stance in their own narrow system^ have 
 D 3 ' at 
 
78 
 
 di last fancied they trace its source in 
 interest and vanity. " Tiie little soul is 
 like a vapour, that hovers round the 
 marshy lake, which never rises on the 
 green hill, lest the winds meet it there *." 
 Tlie Colonel is not expected for some 
 weeks, and how long will they be flying 
 by ? But away with anticipation ! I am 
 awakened to a new sense of being ; its term 
 may be transient, but it shall be worth an 
 age of monotonous existence. I am be- 
 come an Epicurean upon principles the 
 most retined and systematic ; I am already 
 restored to that happy alchemy of mind, 
 which turns even the dross of life to gold; 
 1 have flung away the smoked glass, 
 through which I glanced at nature, and 
 ^iew her now only through the vivid 
 colouring of a prism : like a child, I shall 
 live only for the present ; the past and 
 future shall be equally lost to me ; and 
 I shall resign myself to a series of pleasing 
 and delicious emotions, which shall gently 
 agitate the heart, without fatiguing the 
 mind ; which shall awaken the senses, 
 without satiating them. 
 
 ■ * Oflian, 
 
 LETTER 
 
19 
 
 LETTER XIX. 
 
 There Is a small apartment, In a re- 
 mote wing of this vast Gothic mansion, 
 fitted up in the most tasteful style of sim- 
 ple elegance, and furnished with books, 
 music, drawing materials, &c. Having 
 discovered this temple of taste by mere 
 chance, and guessing the votarist wlio 
 worsliipped in it, I stole there the other 
 morning after breakfast, when i knew she 
 was busied in dom.estic concerns, and th-at 
 Sir Patrick vv'as engaged with his steward. 
 Never did I pass a more delightful hour; 
 a common-place book, that lay open on 
 the writing desk, attracted my eye : it 
 seemed the repository of those impulsive 
 effusions of mind, which, without possess- 
 ing the critical correctness that marks 
 premeditated composition, have always an 
 originality which excites interest and 
 fascinates attention. I could not be mis- 
 taken in the supposition, for in the first 
 page I turned over was a faded rose-leaf; 
 under it was written : " Seated between 
 my beloved parents, at the close of a June 
 evening, 17 — , I placed this rose-leaf 
 here. Beautiful emblem of my sweet and 
 transient bliss! time may spare you as a 
 memento of past happiness, and suffer you 
 to live a little longer than your destined 
 r 4 period 
 
8o 
 
 period of fragile existence ; but when 
 decay shall reach the freshness of vonr 
 blush, may your fragrance survive your 
 bloom, hke the remembrance of those 
 faded emotions to which my heart was 
 alive, when I placed you here !" To this 
 simple apostrophe of filial tenderness 
 succeeded a thousand delightful ideas, in 
 which elegance of taste, chastity of 
 thought, and the most playful vein of 
 fancy, mingled and combined their graces, 
 and gave me a more perfect insight into 
 the character of this charming woman, 
 than I should probably liave obtained on 
 the acquaintance of an age. While I 
 was thus pleasingly engrossed, I heard a 
 light footstep approaching the room : a 
 thief caught in the very fact, could not 
 have felt more consternation ; I snatched 
 lip a pencil and paper, and seemed busily 
 employed. Olivia entered, and started at 
 iin-ling her room so occupied ; but seeing 
 me very earnestly engaged, and appearing 
 not to notice her entrance, she took up a 
 book, and retired on tiptoe. When we 
 met, she took no notice of the circum- 
 stance ; and, encouraged by her silence, I 
 made a second and third invasion, always 
 bringing my port-folio with me, and pla- 
 cing myself ina window which command- 
 ed a prospect she had frequently heard 
 mc admire. At first she absented herself, 
 
 on 
 
on the plea of not disturbing mc ; but 
 linding me perfectly harmless, apparent- 
 ly indifferent to her presence, and deep- 
 ly engaged with my drawing, she yester- 
 day sat down to her harp to practise. 
 Too soon did she force nie to lay aside 
 the part I had assumed ; the pencil dropt 
 from my hand, and my eyes, my whole 
 soul, my every sense became fastened on 
 my dangerous hostess. The position in 
 which she sat, gave me only a glimpse of 
 her profile — its expression was divine; the 
 half-recumbent attitude of her form was 
 full of grace ; but the impassioned sensi- 
 bility that trembled in her round and 
 mellow voice, the air she sung, and the 
 words to which she adapted it, were to 
 me a thousand times more bewitchincr 
 than even grace and beauty ; and, unable 
 to resist the force of my feelings, I sprung 
 from my seat, snatched her hand from 
 the strings, and in a moment of delirium 
 pressed it to my lips. Her confusion and 
 amazement restored me to myself. " For- 
 give me," said I; " you must forgive 
 me ! There is a style of melody, when 
 the mind is of a certain tone, adapted to 
 words over which the heart dissolves, to 
 which every fine sense vibrates in unison, 
 and sung with an expression that speaks 
 the rapt soul of the enchanting musician, 
 against which I am not a proof; then f 
 p 5 ain- 
 
82 
 
 am bofne away ; and the extravagance of 
 my actions is but too frequently propor- 
 tioned to the excess of my emotion." 
 
 *' Certainly," said she, resuming her 
 usual ease, and withdrawing her hand 
 •which I still retained, " I can forgive those 
 emotions, to which I am myself too fre- 
 quently t'le victim : to me, they are the 
 most grateful and flattering homage that 
 can be paid; for if there are few, who 
 are alive to exquisite feeling, there are 
 not many endowed with the capability of 
 exciting it." 
 
 *' And in you, my charming friend, 
 are united these delightful faculties, in a 
 degree more eminent than I ever met with 
 in any one being." 
 
 " Ah, flatterer! but it is the song, 
 and not the songstress, that has awakened 
 these raptures : the air is indeed composed 
 in the true tone of passion and sentiment ; 
 and the influence such music holds over 
 the mind of the auditor, will always be 
 proportioned to the strength of genius and 
 chastity of taste by which it is endowed. 
 The man of genius only dares deviate 
 from the path of fashion and custom; and 
 while the niceties, the intricacies of com- 
 plicated harmony, please the musician, the 
 heart of feeling and the soul of taste swell 
 to the inspiration of melody and nature. 
 But come j I fear I am insensibly leading 
 
 you 
 
H 
 
 you back to that frenzy of enthusiasm yoa 
 so lately deplored ; but I must sing this 
 little song again for you, and convert the 
 poison into an antidote." 
 
 " No, Olivia, do not sing for me; I 
 dare not listen again * to the voice of the 
 « charmer ;' but the words, I am sure, are 
 your own composition ; will you have the 
 goodness to repeat them?" She imme- 
 diately complied : they ran as follows : 
 
 STANZAS. 
 
 T. 
 
 The glowing heart that seeks its kindred heart, 
 Beats slow and languid through the listless hours; 
 
 Still vainly anxious seeks its dearer part, 
 
 And droops, to try its fond and latent pow'rs. 
 
 II. 
 
 Each nerve, each fibre, delicate, refin'd — 
 No common object can bestow the treasure; 
 
 It seeks a kindred soul, a kindred mind. 
 To mingle intellect with ev'ry pleasure. 
 
 III. 
 
 Ah ! sensate heart ! how hard to form the tie 
 
 T'hat can exalt thee to a state divine ; 
 When glance replies to glance, and sigh to sigh, 
 
 And every throbbing pulse beats true to thine! 
 
 Her song was a thousand times less dan- 
 gerous than her sentiments. The voice, the 
 look with which they were uttered ! She 
 D 6 must 
 
84 
 
 must have read all that passed vvlihin my 
 mind as I leaned on her harp, silent and 
 overwhelmed; for I was no longer alone 
 agitated, alone confused ; it was a inornent 
 the most distressing, the most delightful 
 of my life. Olivia rose to lelire in silent 
 emotion : as she passed nic, a flower 
 dropped from her bosom ; a moment be- 
 fore her head had drooj^ed over it ; a tear 
 glittered on its leaf; it could not have 
 been dew, for it was a faded rose, and 
 there was nothing fresh about it, but the 
 precious drop that embalmed it. I remem- 
 ber to have seen in a Benedictine convent 
 at Vendome a relic which raised a consi- 
 derable revenue to its possessors, from the 
 superstitious devotion that was paid to it; 
 it was a crystal vial, presented by an angel 
 to Mary Magdalen, and supposed to have 
 contained the tear dropped by her divine 
 Reformer to the memory of his departed 
 friend. The allusion may be profane; but 
 my faded rose-leaf, wet with the tear of 
 genius and sensibility, is to me what the 
 sacred vial is to the monks of St. Bene- 
 dict ; from a motive less devout, I confess, 
 in one sense, but certainly more disinter* 
 tsted in another. 
 
85 
 
 LETTER XX. 
 
 T ENVY not the fabled bliss of the Hy- 
 perboreans, with their ten centuries of 
 spring, youth, health, and happiness ; my 
 full heart is inaccessible even to a wish, 
 and the happiness in which it revels is 
 independent of increase, from the con- 
 trasted satisfaction of others, the retrospect 
 of past sufferings, or the anxiety of fu- 
 ture expectations. One sentiment wholly 
 possesses me, throbs in every pulse, ani- 
 mates every sense, and gives to my rap- 
 turous moments all the soul of life. In 
 the morning I awake from a delicious 
 dream of bliss and of Olivia ; my heart's 
 light throb heaves with the delight of 
 beholding her; the next moment I am at 
 her side, and I contrive, by a thousand 
 little artifices, to preserve my enviable 
 station for the greater part of the day. 
 The attractive force of congenial feeling 
 draws from the mutual mind the mutual' 
 sentiment. Hour flics rapidly after hour, 
 and the period of their transient existence 
 is only marked by the transition tVom one 
 delightful sensation to another. Youth, 
 beauty, music, and poetry, all the witch- 
 ery of sympathy, and ail the powers of 
 sensibility, unite their blandishments to 
 seduce the heart and intoxicate the senses -. 
 
 and 
 
86 
 
 and if they Involve the soul in a fleeting 
 delusion, it is a delusion worth all the 
 reaHty of dull plodding life and cold com- 
 mon-place emotion. 
 
 I fear I torment you by my letters ; for 
 I find 1 have very few of a great many 
 
 covers left me by Lord L . The fact 
 
 is, a heart intoxicated with its own happi- 
 ness unbosoms itself vvliere, and as often 
 as it can ; its multiplies its enjoyments by 
 repetition, and gratities that smihng prin- 
 ciple, inherent in every generous breast, 
 that of sharing the happiness it feels. My 
 precious relic, my rose, continues in high 
 preservation, and, as I have stopped its 
 pores, may do so for a series of time. 
 
 LETTER XXL 
 
 Nothing can be more delightful than 
 what I term the intimate society of Des- 
 mond Abbey : it is formed of a few pleas- 
 ing, unaffected women ; consisting chiefly 
 of the parish rector's wife and daughters, 
 and the family of a man of taste and let- 
 ters, who has retired hither npon econo- 
 mical motives. They are neither very hand- 
 some nor very brilliant, and happily des- 
 titute of that fashionable jargon of accom- 
 plishments which anno} s you so much in 
 
 the 
 
8? 
 
 the misses o( Juut-lon. Some of them are 
 well-informed, some of them musical, and 
 all amiable, lively, and good-humoured, 
 looking up to my all-superior OUvia, with 
 an admiration almost amounting to ido- 
 latry, but perfectly free from envy ; and 
 indeed I belie i^e they are the only women 
 who know her, who do not hate her for 
 that superiority they cannot fail to feel. 
 The men who are the most in the en-farnille 
 with us, are a few officers of an English 
 tegiment quartered in the next garrison 
 town : they are men of taste, information, 
 and very superior manners (and I must 
 confess to you, in my eyes but too pleas- 
 ing and too insinuating). There is cer- 
 tainly not a wit amongst us ; and our con- 
 versation, exempt from that gladiatorial 
 exertion of colloquial skill, which is al- 
 ways embittered by the gall of rivalship, 
 and degraded by the hatred of superiority, 
 is easy, desultory, and animated ; abound- 
 ing with that candid intercourse of senti- 
 ments and opinions which, in my mind, 
 forms one" of the most refined pleasures 
 of society. In such society the heart and 
 spirits repose ; and if the greater faculties 
 of the mind lie dormant, a thousand little 
 nameless pleasures that flow from taste, 
 feeling, fancy, and vivacity, are awakened 
 into existence. The great principle that 
 animates our little club is cheerfulness; 
 
 ** without 
 
88 
 
 '^^ without the enforcement of which," says 
 Sterne, " the Thirty-nine Articles are in- 
 complete." We write bad verses, pro- 
 nounce extempore epigrams on each other, 
 compose pasquinades, and even sometimes 
 descend to riddles and charades, at which 
 I am become wonderfully expert, and have 
 already ransacked the four elements for my 
 Jirsfs, my seconds, and my tontes. Amidst, 
 however, these trifling effusions of careless 
 amusement are sometimes produced some 
 elegant ideas elegantly realized ; and the 
 poetical fragments of the sly Olivia, by 
 the exquisite selection of the thoughts, 
 and musical composition of the verse, do 
 equal honour to her taste and judgment, 
 and are evidently written to extort some- 
 thing more than the frolic smile, which we 
 all look up to as the reward of our less 
 studied and less polished productions. How 
 J love these ^^ riens naifs et pleins de grace ^"^ 
 which, in the bosom of an agreeable lei- 
 sure, enable us to gaily " play the trifle 
 life away !" It is certain there arc very 
 few who know how to live 1 Tlie petit s 
 soupers of the celebrated Madame de Mar- 
 tel Fontaine*, if more brilliant, v.'ere not 
 more delightful than Olivia's; then she 
 appears in the happiest of her phases, and 
 
 * Celebrated by Voltaire and others, for the free-> 
 doir), elegance, and gaiety of her etUertainments. 
 
 there 
 
89 
 
 there is sometimes a vein of arch playful- 
 ness in her manner, as might shame llie 
 laughing air of an Euphrosyne. 
 
 I am told, that though she has not dimi- 
 nished the hospitable propensities of her 
 grandfather, she has taught them to flow- 
 in a better channel ; and that the society 
 of the Abbey is more discriminate, more 
 select, though scarcely less numerous, 
 since she has presided as its mistress. It 
 is certain, that indiscriminate hospitality is 
 the virtue of an uncivilized people, and 
 while it apparently breathes the very spirit 
 of philanthropy, originates most frequently 
 in self-love. The mind, unaccustomed 
 to commune with itself, barren of ideas, 
 and void of reflection, is thrown wholly 
 dependant on society for occupation and 
 engagement, and adopts every species of 
 social and familiar intercourse, which by 
 opposing that vacillation of intellect, 
 against which human nature (except in 
 her most imbecile state) revolts, relieves 
 it from the dreadful oppression of the 
 tciimm vita:: — hence the indibcriminate 
 hospitality of savage nations, and even of 
 the less refined inhabitants of the most 
 polished states. The Brehon laws of the 
 ancient Irish forbade the breaking up of 
 a sept too suddenly, lest the traveller 
 might be disappointed of his expected en- 
 tertainment ; and many traces of this hos- 
 
 pitable 
 
pitable spirit are still to be found amon^ 
 the modern Irish of every description, 
 and too often to the prejudice of their 
 circumstances, constitution, and minds ; 
 for a national custom which would be 
 sometimes " more honoured in the breach 
 than the observance," frequently leads ta 
 an extravagance that involves them in 
 pecuniary diiticulties, while the excesses of 
 which it is productive, are equally detri- 
 mental to the health ; and it is certain, 
 that amidst the boundless freedom of con- 
 vivial jocularity, and the unrestrained en- 
 joyments of social intercourse, the mind 
 and manners must lose in refinement, 
 what the passions acquire in strength and 
 vehemence. The society of his grand- 
 daughter is daily rendering Sir Patrick 
 Desmond independent of every other. Her 
 conversation, full of variety and anecdote, 
 can accommodate itself to every under- 
 standing that does not fall short of medio- 
 crity : modest and unassuming, her cheek 
 frequently blushes at the superiority her 
 jips confer; rather playfully arch than 
 witty, and fascinating than brilliant. In 
 energy of expression, and persuasive ten- 
 derness in sentimental observation, she 
 stands, in my opinion, unequalled and 
 unrivalled : her talents, rather versatile than 
 individually striking, give that variety to 
 her character which is most grateful to the 
 
 caprice 
 
9^ 
 
 of our nature ; and the sensibility of her 
 warm heart, and the vivacity of her tem- 
 per, bestow that facility on her manners 
 which renders her ease infectious to the 
 most formal ; the restraint of unconcfenial 
 society throws her from herself, and the 
 fear of meriting the title of a learned lady, 
 renders her more anxious at times to con- 
 ceal her superiority, than other women 
 arc to display theirs. But she still always 
 retains a magic something in her air, her 
 manner, analogous to those jxraces in moral 
 virtue which set the line of et/iic rule at 
 defiance, to the je ne sgais quoi in personal 
 beauty, which description cannot express. 
 Happily there are but few Olivias, or 
 the power of woman would become as 
 dangerous from intellectual influence, as 
 it is now from personal attraction. I have 
 always observed, in the course of my little 
 reading, that those women who governed 
 the hearts and understandings of men 
 with the most unbounded sway, owed 
 their power less to the witchery of beauty 
 and the charm of youth, than to strength 
 of mind and cultivation of talents. As- 
 pasia * was no longer young, when Socrates 
 became her disciple, and imbibed the 
 principles of i\\& philosophia amatoria at her 
 
 * The Samian war was undertaken by Pericles at 
 the instigation of Aspasia. 
 
 feet. 
 
92 
 
 feet, nnd when Athens was governed by 
 her dcrrces throiif^h the medium oi Peri- 
 cles. Corintia, of whose talents we read 
 so mnch, and of whose beauty we know 
 so little, presided over the studies, as well 
 as the heart of Pindar. The abilities of 
 Calhtrine raised her from a cottage to a 
 throne. Maintcnon, in the decline of lite, 
 had more power over the heart and coun- 
 cils of Louis the Fourteenth, than La 
 Valliere in all the attractions of youth, or 
 IVIontespan in all the splendour of beauty; 
 and if we are to credit the assertions oi 
 Dio, the only gallantry the voice of scan- 
 dal could lay to the charge of Cicero, was 
 his attachment and literary correspondence 
 with Ca3sellia, a female wit, and a philo- 
 sopher of seventy : and this, 1 believe, is 
 bringing as strong an argument in lavour 
 of my position as could be desired. A 
 woman merely beautiful may attract ; a 
 woman merely accomplished may amuse, 
 and both unhed may produce a transient 
 fascination ; but it is sense and virtue only 
 that fasten on the mind : if to these pre- 
 cious qualities are added a certain refine- 
 ment and elegance of taste, and a certain 
 delicacy and elevation of sentiment united 
 to animation of temper and softness of 
 manners, the power of their possessor be- 
 comes altogether irresistible; it is acknow- 
 ledged by the heart, it is ratified by the 
 
 under- 
 
93 
 
 .understanding, and it exalts every delight 
 the senses can bestow. I always thought 
 this, but I ean now aver it from a sweet, 
 but, I fear, a fatal experience ! 
 
 LETTER XXII. 
 
 Those infant prejudices in favour of 
 "Sir Patrick Desmond, which marked the 
 first period of our acquaintance, are hourly 
 ripening into maturity. He has tailings — . 
 and who has not ? — but they are of that 
 description whicli ever meet with indul- 
 gence from society, because they neither 
 originaie in narrow principles nor an un- 
 generous mind ; for I have observed, that 
 those errors which can be traced to such 
 a source, though less destructive in their 
 effects on mankind than those which ori- 
 ginate in a boundless spirit and vehement 
 passions, ever find less toleration. '- Vices," 
 says Plato, " as well as virtues, are great 
 in great minds." Happily the natural bent 
 of my own taste coincides with his most 
 favourite pursuits; and as I am hourly 
 becoming, in some degree, more necessary 
 to him, the lie which binds us is of mu- 
 tual torce. I love to listen to, and he to 
 repeat, his old traditional stories ; I love 
 them iVom a twofold motive, tor they pro- 
 cure 
 
94 
 
 icure me many hours of that society, which 
 I could not otherwise enjoy without ex- 
 citing suspicion even in the breast of the 
 most unsuspicious of all human beings ; 
 for while " he hutns the song of other 
 limes," and talks of the *' sunbeams of 
 other days, and the delights of the heroes 
 of old," 1 am suffered to trifle at Olivia's 
 work-table, hang on the back of her chair, 
 or assist her in the drawing. Sometimes, 
 when we are alone, we ramble out in the 
 evenings, Olivia leaning on her grand- 
 father's arm, and he on mine. 1 am always 
 supplied with pencil and paper. A ruin, to 
 which many an oral tale is attached, and 
 
 " On the top whereof aye dwells the ghastly owl, 
 Shrieking his baleful note," 
 
 strikes our eyes : I am immediately set to 
 work. The old gentleman (wlio is not 
 wholly free from a superstition, which the 
 liveliness of his imagination, even at three- 
 score, is well adapted to nourish) repeats 
 the various talcs of its being still the haunt 
 of " witches and ghosts who rove at mid- 
 night hour," or digresses into the history 
 of its former lords; generally concluding 
 with an emphatic shake of the head, and 
 a melancholy apostrophe from Ossian ; 
 ** why dost thou build the hall, son of the 
 winged days? thou lookcst from thy tower 
 to-day, yet a few years, and the blast of 
 5 the 
 
95 
 
 the desert shall come ; it howls in thy 
 empty court, and whistles round thy half- 
 worn shield." Olivia sometimes seats 
 herself on a broken fragment with a book, 
 but oftener laughs heart' ly at us both, de- 
 faces a Gothic window by a sly touch of 
 the elbow, or razes the whole structure 
 by running away with my paper, or jerk- 
 ing my pencil out of my lingers. The old 
 gentleman smiles and chides by turns; and 
 we all return home in the best spirits, and 
 with the best appetite in the world, to a 
 little music and an early supper. " 1 
 liked you," said he to me the other night, 
 *' at first for your father's sake, and now 
 for your own." — " And for whose sake am 
 I to like you?" said Olivia archly. Ah ! 
 the sorceress ! I sometimes think she is 
 determined on my destruction. This morn- 
 ing I was leaning in a musing posture on 
 her piano-forte ; she tapped me genily on 
 the shoulder; " What are you thiiking 
 of so earnestly, my good friend ?" — " Of 
 you." — " Of me 1 Oh! then 1 will run 
 away, that you may think of me again." 
 — " And is your absence requisite for that, 
 Olivia ?" — " \V hy, 1 have somewhere read 
 of a river in Greece which illuminated a 
 torch when held at a moderate distance, 
 but extinguishc'd it on a nearer approach." 
 — " I understand \ our allusion ; you think 
 a short absence favourable to love." — " To 
 
 love ! 
 
9« 
 
 love! Were we talking of love?"—*' I 
 was tliinking of ii." — " You said yea 
 were thinking of me." — " You are sy- 
 nonymous." 
 
 I W'. ;ilcl have given, a thousand worlds 
 to have- retracted my folly. She turned 
 from n\c without answering, but not till I 
 observed her smileshad vanished, her colour 
 fled, a? d the most pensive gravity had 
 taken possession of her features; " yet it 
 was a 'ountenance more in sorrow than 
 in anger," as if she lamented my weakness, 
 rather I ban resented my temerity. We 
 did not meet till dinner; and, for the first 
 time, 1 rejoiced that our little circle was 
 enlarged by a crowd of company. She 
 speaks of her future husband with an ease 
 that amazes me ; for I well know, that, 
 in a mind like hers, love is surrounded by 
 all those delicate mysteries of sensitive 
 reserve which shuns observation, and trea- 
 sures the idol of its homage in the last 
 secret recess of the heart. His name scarcely 
 deepens the blush on her cheek, and the 
 arrival of his letters does not seem to in- 
 crease the palpitation of a single pulse : 
 she never speaks of him as a lover, or the 
 destined com})anion of her life; but as a 
 friend whom she highly esteems ; and 
 others are delicate enougli to mention him 
 only in the same ligiit ; to m.e she never 
 8peaks ol him, and 1 eouid almost believe 
 
 she 
 
97 
 she considers herself as the dove destined 
 to bestow the oHve-branch, without the 
 hope of finding a resting-place for her 
 own bosom. Ah ! my dear friend, what 
 a train of reflections (dangerous reflec- 
 tions !) does this supposition awaken ! 
 
 LETTER XXIII. 
 
 Lord and Lady L came home yes- 
 terday, and I am returned to my Siberia, 
 my Kamtschatka ; in short, I am no longer 
 under the same roof with Olivia ; and I 
 now feel how possible it is to hold an ex- 
 istence only in the being of another ! I 
 counted every moment as it fled during 
 my last week's residence at the Abbey ; it 
 was a wretched calculation, and every in- 
 crease of my calendar was made with a 
 sigh, as heart-felt as that the captive heaves 
 when he notches on his stick the expiration 
 of each day's misery ! You would laugh 
 at me, did you know what I suffered at 
 parting, though only separated from her 
 by three short miles. She walked with her 
 grandfather to the end of the avenue with 
 me ; then the old gentleman gave me his 
 hand, and pressed mine with a cordiality 
 to which it has been long a stranger : 
 Olivia too held out hers to me vvitli a smile ; 
 E yet. 
 
98 
 
 yet, I thought, with a look tender and 
 melancholy : " In love's hours," said she, 
 *' it has been said there are many days, 
 but I feel that friendship reverses the 
 maxim." 
 
 *' Then how must I feel ?" said I. 
 
 *' Why," said the Baronet, *' as one, I 
 hope, who is sensible of sufficient regret 
 at leaving us, to induce him frequently to 
 be our guest." Here we parted, and how 
 I performed the rest of my little journey 
 
 I know not. The family of L received 
 
 me v/ith that courteous civility which 
 seems purely the effect of habitual polite- 
 ness, equally independent of sentiment or 
 intention. Oh ! the vast difference be- 
 tween that civil attention, which is merely 
 the result of what is termed good breed- 
 ing, and that cordial effusion of kindness, 
 which flows from the warm impulses of a 
 kind heart ! Never did the contrast strike 
 me more forcibly. 
 
 I have received your letter, and judged 
 its import before I opened it. You triumph 
 in the realization of your prophecy: my 
 friendship is converted into a passion, im- 
 petuous and ardent as my nature, and you 
 moralize and philosophize admirably on 
 the consequences that may ensue; but 
 your morality is too refined, and your 
 philosophy too dognatic ; my understand- 
 ing has preached to my heart a thousand 
 
 times 
 
99 
 
 times as you have done, and to the same 
 purpose : 
 
 •" Hang up philosophy ; 
 Unless philosophy can make a Juliet, 
 It helps not, it prevails not." 
 
 Poor Romeo ! T am at present contented 
 to be of his school, and leave you to era- 
 brace the stoic, academic, peripatetic, or 
 any other system you please. 
 
 LETTER XXIV. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 Where are you, my good friend ? and 
 why do we not see you at the Abbey ? 
 Is there not some little artifice in this ? You 
 would teach us the value of your society, 
 by its loss. In love*s theory the precept 
 may be admissible, and a woman (like a 
 Chinese Emperor) may involve herself in 
 mysterious retireraent,to secure the homage 
 of her vassals ; but coquetry in friendship 
 is more intolerable than ostentation in reli- 
 gion ! The truth is, therefore, you are 
 grown as indolent as a Turk, 1 had almost 
 said as stupid. Here is the piano-forte 
 just as you left it, without a string — Apro- 
 pos, borrow some German wire from 
 
 Lady L , and put it in your pocket 
 
 E 2 when 
 
100 
 
 when you come over. Here too is the 
 half-finlshedplan of the grotto, in as rough 
 and wild a ^tate as the most savage fancy 
 could design it ; and I have not hjoked 
 into Gottsched since you left us. In short, 
 you make yourseli so useful an animal, 
 that I hourly find *' I couH have hetter 
 spared a hetter man." I send you all your 
 books, except Ha Her. 
 
 LETTER XXV. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 Am I indeed the worthless fellow you 
 describe me, or do you imagine, '* I rua 
 away upon insliuci, like li^'alsiatf Ironi 
 the shadow of impending danger ? Alas ! 
 instinct has never so befriended me, and, 
 like many others, I am but too apt to 
 *' meet my death by looking on my life." 
 The truth is, I have been three times at 
 the Abbey, without being able to get a 
 glimpse of you : yestcr(iay I entered the 
 tishinsf-house in less than an hour after 
 you had left it (as the gardener told me) 
 with a party of ladies; and twice you were 
 visitincf at the Castle, when I, in all the 
 pettishness of disappointment, was wan- 
 dering about the grounds of Desmond. 
 Thus, my charming friend, for this week 
 
 back 
 
lOI 
 
 back we have been like two lines in ma- 
 thematical certainty, which may continue 
 to approximate ad infinitum, without ever 
 coming into contact ; and the comparison 
 mia;ht be admissible in a sense more ex- 
 tensive than that lo which it is at present 
 applied. No, I hate coquetry in friendship, 
 as much as you possibly can ; nor am I 
 sufficiently endowed with self-denial to 
 refine upon its enjoyment by a voluntary 
 sequestration from its object : it is however 
 certain, that temporary removals. heighten 
 and exalt the fervour of every attachment, 
 ■whether of love, friendship, or collateral 
 affection ; and I may say with great truth, 
 that I am never more with you, my amiable 
 friend, than when absent from you; and 
 yet it is not being with you cither, for your 
 idea is so closely interwoven with every: 
 thought of my soul, that I feel it rather 
 like an innate than a naturalized principle; 
 and my mind has no longer the power to 
 dissolve the connexion, even if my wishes 
 led to the separation. To-morrow the 
 
 family of L dine with one of your 
 
 chieftains, and I shall fly to my Alhambra; 
 then the ijrotto shall be finished, the 
 piano-forte shall be strung, Gottsched shall 
 be read, and 1 shall be Olivia's very pru- 
 dent friend ; in spite of her song, her 
 harp, and even the sly smile that creates 
 E 3 the- 
 
I02, 
 
 the little dimple on the left side of the 
 little mouth. 
 
 I send yon a fragment, which you have 
 a right to see ; since thinking on some 
 transient, blissful hours 1 had spent in your 
 society gave rise to the reflections that 
 occasioned it. 
 
 PBAGMENT. 
 
 Ye tender, bitter recollections, spare me ; 
 
 Avaunt, ye shadowy spirits of bliss and sorrow j 
 W by, cruel, dear intruders, ever near me ? 
 
 Haply my joy to-day, my woe to-morrow, 
 
 ir. 
 
 For every blessing your possession gave me 
 Leaves in its absence still a kindred sorrow ; 
 
 Ye lov'd, yet fear'd intruders, leave, ah ! leave me. 
 For if you bless to-day, you wound to-morrow. 
 
 in. 
 
 Thus the wild fading rose in pale decay, 
 
 Dew gemm'd its head, reclin'd in seeming sorrow; 
 
 Yet though its blushing honours die to-day, 
 
 Its poignant thorns shall live and wound to-mor- 
 row. 
 
 LETTER 
 
103 
 LETTER XXVT. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 Ah pilferer ! return me my manuscript, 
 or judge the vengeance of the whole Par- 
 nassian legion : I did not miss it till this 
 morning, when I was looking over my 
 porte-feuille, for your drawing from Ossian. 
 Apropos, there is too much ga'iete de cceur 
 in the countenance of Malvina. Do you 
 know it has a strong likeness of your 
 Jittle friend ? even the parson detected the 
 resemblance. " This has too much of 
 your Euphrosyne air," said he to me, " to 
 be characteristic of the pensive Malvina." 
 Grandpapa desires I will request you to 
 come over to us this evening. A peasant 
 has found some old coin amidst the rub- 
 bish of a ruin in the neighbourhood; 
 grandpapa is quite elated, and you must 
 come and share the triumph da virtuosa. 
 You shall have coffee in the fishing-house, 
 and I have ordered the harp there. 1 feel 
 an elasticity of mind, and a flow of spirits 
 to-day, for which I cannot account. This 
 is a certain species of happiness, independ- 
 ent of every external gratification, to 
 which I am frequently subject, and is one 
 of the most lively enjoyments which 
 Providence has annexed to my being. 
 E 4 Come 
 
104 
 
 Come not therefore to me with your grave 
 face and pensive air, 
 
 " Like one well studied in sad ostent, 
 To please his grand-datli." 
 
 The laughing graces of Desmond would 
 take flight at the appearance of the sombre 
 vision. 
 
 " On est heureux des qu'on est sage,"^ 
 
 says the Cardinal dc Bernis; but I reverse 
 the maxim in my present disposition, and 
 believe that " we are wise when we are 
 happy." This evening in my little Tus- 
 culum*, (as you call the fishing-house), 
 you shall sec my philosophy is not merely 
 speculative ! — What say you to becoming 
 my disciple ? Remember I stipulate for 
 smiles 1 but none of your Cassius-like 
 smiles, as if you '* scorned your spirit, 
 that could be moved to smile at any thing.'* 
 You often smile in this manner ; and in- 
 deed too frequently in general society re- 
 verse the golden rule of 
 
 *' Volto sciolto, pensieri stretti,** 
 
 * The favourite retreat of TuIIy. 
 
 LETTER 
 
105 
 LETTER XXVII. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 I FLY to you, my charming friend ; I 
 fly to meet you at your little Tusculum. 
 Friendship has not in the world, nor love 
 in Cnidus or Paphos, a more delightful 
 ^asylum, a retreat more formed for the en- 
 joyment of tender emotions, or tender 
 sighs. But, alas ! it is my wishes only that 
 have taken wing ; four hours, four heavy 
 hours, must steal away with lazy pace, 
 before I behold you or Tusculum. 
 
 Is my portrait of Malvina indeed like 
 you ? This has happened with two or three 
 others I have lately done : how is it to be 
 accounted for ? 1 think it was Simon 
 Martina^ who was so impressed with the 
 beauty of Laura, that all his female pic- 
 tures resembled her ; — dare I draw any 
 allusion ? Adieu, my sweet friend, my 
 amiable sister 1 for I may at least claim aa 
 affinity to you on the side of soul ; and 
 that, in my opinion, is a stronger, closer 
 relationship, than any to be found. in na* 
 ture's catalogue of collateral connexions. 
 
 I had almost forgot to promise you 
 that I would leave my grave face and pen- 
 sive air at the castle of L ; and that I 
 
 E 5 would 
 
io6 
 
 VTOuld come to you, with all the vivida 
 •vis animcc I could muster. 
 
 Am I not a greater thief than an Arab ? 
 You shall however have a copy of your 
 manuscript 
 
 " Spirits are finely touched. 
 But to fine issue :" 
 
 And the unusual flow of vivacity that ani- 
 mates yours, is, I hope, but the laughing 
 anticipation of impending joys : I am self- 
 ish enough to vv'ish, that they may light 
 on you, under a thousand delightful forms, 
 this evening; and then the chance of a 
 participation may be mine. Ah ! how de- 
 lightful 
 
 " De parler, sur la fin du jonr, 
 De vers, de musique ct d'amour !" 
 
 The last word might have been omitted, 
 for it renders the quotation inapplicable — 
 do you erase it. Once more adieu. My 
 adieus are like a preface to a second vo- 
 lume ; and yet, 
 
 *• What have I gain'd by this one minute more ? 
 Only to wish another and another," 
 
 LETTER 
 
107 
 LETTER XXVIII. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 Give me no more such little festivals, 
 my charming friend, or dread the conse- 
 quences. The very air of your Tusculum 
 was infectious, ^nd diffused its delicious 
 poison through my whole frame. Never 
 were you truly yourself until last night : 
 the *iire of your vivacity was moderated 
 by a thousand touching graces ; the anima- 
 tion of your manner was tempered by 
 the most insinuating softness; you blushed 
 more frequently than usual, but it was 
 the blush of pleasure, chastened by senti- 
 ment ; and the lively glow, that diffused 
 itself over your smiling countenance, 
 spoke the sensibility of the heart from 
 whence it flowed ; you sung, and my soul 
 hung upon every note that sighed its 
 trembling melody on your lips. — I v^as no 
 longer myself — I felt my danger, and I 
 trembled for my temerity ; I would have 
 fled, but the voice of Olivia detained me. 
 You said half audibly, and with a meaning 
 smile, " II y a des rivieres qui ne fo7it jamais 
 tant du bien, que quand elks se dehordent^ 
 ainsi Vamitie ria rien tneilleur que VexcesJ^ " 
 * " As some rivers fertilize the banks they overflow, 
 80 in friendship there is nothing better than excess." 
 
 Balzac. 
 
 E 6 Ah! 
 
io8 
 
 Ah ! sorceress, what a method did you 
 take to moderate that excess of friendship, 
 which had not escaped your observation ! 
 You drew your harp to you, andsungthat 
 air, which, even in a cooler moment, I 
 cannot hear without emotion. You tri- 
 umphed in the witchcraft of your powers ; 
 I saw you did, Olivia, and I remained 
 overwhelmed and lost in delirium ; while 
 
 Captain M , at the other side of you, 
 
 vv^as crying *' Charming, extremely well 
 indeed !" and shaking his head like a 
 Mandarin, when he fancied he was doing 
 it with the musical emphasis of an 
 amateur ; and yet, Olivia, his admiration 
 did not displease you : he is certainly a 
 I'cry handsome man. 
 
 How agreeable, how unaffected were 
 your two female friends ! I think I see 
 them at this moment, dressed at all points, 
 seated so demurely at their netting, steal- 
 ing a sly glance at the invincible Captain, 
 tossing up their heads when caught in the 
 very fact, and tittering and simpering so 
 prettily when he addressed them. Then 
 the form of Olivia presents itself, bending 
 grace tuliy over her harp. That dress too, 
 so simple, yet so artfully contrived to set 
 off the symmetry of her form ! what a 
 head presented itself v^hen the straw hat 
 was thrown by ! The two fair sisters nodded 
 
 their 
 
t09 
 
 their high plumes at each other, and 
 seemed to say, '^ This is looking very 
 charming, at a very easy rate." Your 
 grandfather (poor man !) seemed enrap- 
 tured with you, and never in my eyes did 
 your attentions to him appear less ob- 
 Tious, yet more touching or more interest- 
 ing. Would you believe it, the hour 
 which T devoted to my solitary walk home, 
 was scarcely less delightful than that 
 which I had just passed in your societj'-. 
 Every little circumstance that occurred, 
 every word you uttered, floated in my 
 mind, whh all the additional glow that 
 fancy casts upon those soothing images 
 which memory presents to the senses and 
 the heart. Indeed my thoughts flow 
 always more happily on leaving you than 
 when I am going to you, as the tt-ain of 
 vapour which attends a comet does not 
 betray its lum'inatmi until it has passed the 
 sun. You know you often call me an 
 eccentral hody ; so the allusion holds good. 
 I escaped the insipid garrulity of Lady 
 
 L 's drawing-room, and retired to my 
 
 own apartment, full of those emotions 
 which set the influence of rest at defiance. 
 I arose with the first light that dawned 
 through my window, and my steps invo- 
 luntarily bent to the fishing-house : the 
 Abbey bell tolled five as I entered it. 
 Every thing was just as we had left it the 
 
 preceding 
 
no 
 
 preceding night, and the window, at 
 which we had stood together, was still 
 open ; you had thrown up the sash, to 
 enjoy the fragrance of the air, after a re- 
 freshing shower, whose drops, glittering 
 on the foliage, were tinged with the beam 
 of the setting sun. You pointed to those 
 mountains, which, wild and desolate, 
 bounded the horizon with their curving 
 line: you remarked, as the sun sunk be- 
 hind them, the variety of their aspect, 
 caused by the opposite effect of light and 
 shade. "Those mountains,'* saidyou,*' im- 
 mortalized by the feats of Fingal, where 
 the bards ' sent away the night in song,* 
 and the inspired Ossian immortalized the 
 prowess of the hero, — do they not ' send 
 
 * back your soul to the ages of old, and the 
 
 * days of other years ?' The littlenesses of 
 the world fade into annihilation as I con- 
 template them ; and the life by which 1 
 am so engrossed, so agitated, is reduced 
 to the span of a moment.*' After a 
 pause, you added, " It is certain, my 
 dear friend, that there are objects in na- 
 ture which speak to the heart, and are 
 eminently calculated to purify and elevate 
 the soul. The mild rising of the evening 
 star ; — the moon, stealing in silent majesty 
 amidst those dark masses of vapour that 
 cloud her progress and are silvered by her 
 light ; — the cloud-embosomed summit of 
 
 a distant 
 
XII 
 
 a distant mountain ; — and, above all, 
 those spots where the hero ' fell in the 
 'midst of his renown/ and the immortal 
 mind effused those inspirations which were 
 breathed into the soul when it was first 
 quickened — in the moment of their con- 
 templation, excite those sublime reflec- 
 tions which give us a foretaste of that 
 eternity we were created to enjoy." 
 
 You ceased ! but the voice of the har- 
 monious speaker still dwelt on my ear, 
 while her sentiments were engraven on my 
 heart, and treasured in my memory : in 
 the mean time your fair friends were play- 
 ing off all their artillery of charms against 
 the heart of their military hero, and your 
 grandfather was equally ardent in an en- 
 gagement at the chess-board with the 
 parson. The evening closed in : he return- 
 ed to the Abbey to complete his conquest ; 
 
 and the Miss D s proposed a walk by 
 
 moonlight on the beach, in order to ac- 
 complish theirs. Captain M was en- 
 riched with the hand of each fair besieger, 
 and you honoured me with yours ; yet I 
 thought you did it with a timidity, a re- 
 luctance, that a thousand times (if self- 
 love would have permitted it) urged mc 
 to its resignation ; and even when I did 
 resign the light and precious burden, I felt 
 the warmth of its impression fading oa 
 
 my 
 
112 
 
 my arm, with a romantic regret not to be 
 conceived. 
 
 The pensive solemnity of the hour ; the 
 sublime object which the ocean present- 
 ed, whose feathery spray seemed to swell 
 to the moon-beam that glittered on its sur- 
 face, at first threw a shade over the viva- 
 city of your manner. 
 
 •The wind was hush'd ; 
 
 And to the beach, each slowly lifted wave, 
 Creeping with silver curl, press'd, kiss'd the shore, 
 And slept in peace*." 
 
 But your mind soon regained its wonted 
 tone ; and while I gazed on your speak- 
 ing countenance, and listened to your ac- 
 cents, it seemed as if " eternity was in 
 your lips and eyes." You are never half 
 so delightful as when in (what you term) 
 a prattling mood. Our companions 
 laughed, and trifled, and chatted, as in 
 the side-box at the opera ; and I could 
 not help thinking, with a certain French 
 author, ** that it is not every one knows 
 how to take a walk." 
 
 I have written thus far to you, my 
 charming friend, from your little Tuscu- 
 lum, with my pencil : I shall leave it in 
 your work-bag, which is lying by me, on 
 the window-seat, where you left it last 
 
 * Mason's English Garden. 
 
 night. 
 
"3 
 
 night, and where you will probably be 
 the first to find it in your early walk to 
 your favourite retreat : I leave also with 
 it, an impromptu, occasioned by the emo- 
 tions my re-entrance into this little apart- 
 ment awakened. Adieu, my sweet friend ! 
 you are still reposing in the bosom of a 
 tranquil sleep; and the fairy dreams that 
 hover o'er your pillow, probably partake 
 of that vivid fancy which animates vou 
 when awake : may it be a dream ot bliss ! 
 and may time realize the soothing pro- 
 phecy ot the golden vision ! I shall steal 
 a glance at your chamber-window, as I 
 pass it at a distance ; and then return to 
 the breakfast-table of Lady L " with 
 
 what appetite 1 may." 
 
 FRAGMENT. 
 
 Ye soft sublime emotions of the soul, 
 
 That erst your transports o'er my senses stole, 
 
 And seem'd to bear 
 That soul, upon your glowing joys away, 
 Beyond the term of life's brief cloudy day 
 
 Of strife and care. 
 
 II. 
 
 Oh ! I have felt your soul-ennobling sway 
 At the voluptuous hour of closing day ; 
 
 That much-lov'd hour, 
 When the soft music of a plaintive song 
 Stole o'er the twilight stillness sweet along, 
 
 With thrilling pow'r, 
 
 III. 
 
114 
 III. 
 
 And as it sigh'd athwart the pensive hour. 
 Ah ! not alone I felt its thrilling pow'r ; 
 
 For, o'er my soul 
 The bright enchantment of poetic art. 
 That poetry best form'd to touch the heart, 
 
 from mem'ry stole. 
 
 IV. 
 
 And soft ideas, not more soft than fleet, 
 With poetry and n\\mc mingled sweet, 
 
 And the soft sigh 
 Breath'd o'er the smiling iipj 'twas rapture'9 
 
 smile ; 
 And transports, glowing genuine ; the tear the 
 while 
 
 Beam'd in the eye. 
 
 Oh tell! ye blest emotions of the soul, 
 
 From what delicious source the pow'r ye stole. 
 
 To touch the heart, 
 T' exalt each sense, and bear me thus away : 
 Oh 1 ye sublime and fine emotions say, 
 
 Whence is your art ? 
 
 VI. 
 
 And let me, when the springs of being fail. 
 On thy best joy my raptur'd soul exhale, 
 
 And my last sigh 
 Breathe, with the witching strain of some sweet 
 
 sound, 
 My heart's last throb with bliss poetic bound : 
 Thus let me die. 
 
 LETTER 
 
i'5 
 LETTER XXIX, 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 You are ill, my dear friend ; and you 
 would conceal it from those who are most 
 interested for you : my grandfather says 
 your disorder is only on your spirits, and 
 Captain M , who has seen you, says 
 the same. Then come to me ! You will 
 find me the best physician in the world 
 — my prescriptions infallible ; for they 
 aim at the mind. In such cases. Bacon 
 recommends a lively poem, or a cheerful 
 prospect. Come to the Abbey then, where 
 you shall have both ; and, still more, you 
 shall have a song and a smile into the 
 bargain. 
 
 To-day I was reading of Alphonso of 
 Leon, who was cured of a dangerous ill- 
 ness by the pleasure he felt in reading 
 Quintus Curtius : this made me think of 
 you : are you not obliged to Alphonso ? 
 Remember we shall drink coffee early 
 this evening. Adieu, my poor invalid. 
 Shall I not pray, with Saint Paul, •« May 
 brotherly love continue !" 
 
 P. S. Was it not Eristratus who disco- 
 vered the secret malady of Anthclms by 
 comparing its symptoms with Sappho\ 
 description of the effects of love ? I have 
 
 frequently 
 
ir6 
 
 frequently heard you apostrophize the 
 
 spirit of Miss D 's large black eyes ; 
 
 so be prepared for my analyzation a la 
 Sappho. 
 
 LETTER XXX. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 The very promise of your song and 
 smile has already had more effect on my 
 disorder, than all the prescriptions Celsus 
 or Galen ever wrote : if there is any of it 
 yet luiking, it shall dissipate when 1 be- 
 hold you ; and, like the serpent, who can 
 only be seduced from its prey by the 
 power of harmony, it shall vanish at the 
 sound of your voice. But remember F 
 ioxh'id youx animal mag7ietism \ my disorder 
 shall not be inielUchuilly anatomized. Trust 
 me, my charming doctrcss, it were a dan- 
 gerous experiment ! Malady and a physi- 
 cian, they say, appeared first together ; and 
 perhaps my fair physician would iind less 
 difficulty in deranging my pulse, than in 
 ** ne\so setting it."" 
 
 *' There is more felicity in carrion flies, 
 Than RoTCo: they may seize on the white wonder 
 Of dear Juliet's hand, and steal immortal blessings 
 From her lips." 
 
 Love 
 
Love never conceived, nor poetry 
 adorned, a more refined, a more beautiful 
 sentiment than that ; it has occurred to 
 me a thousand times during my few days' 
 absence from you. 
 
 LETTER XXXI. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 One thought you expressed yesterday 
 evening made a lively impression on me : 
 " Plato mentions four species of "flattery ; 
 St. Clair seems versed in a thousand ; nor 
 are they the less dangerous for being al- 
 ways oblique and indirect." For FJeaven's 
 sake let us understand each other. I re- 
 spect both you and myself too much to 
 descend to adulation ; it is a species of 
 commerce that equally derogates from the 
 dignity of both parties: if, however, there 
 is any flattery in the case, yours was cer- 
 tainly the most obvious, though the most 
 refined. In shewing me some drawings 
 you had latt-Iy finished, you said, " Here 
 is one, which, however inconsequent its 
 SI bject, I prize more than all the rest :'' 
 it was simply a bunch of flowers with the 
 little motto of, 
 
 ** Vivez toiijours," 
 
 written 
 
11 8 
 
 written underneath : I observed that they 
 were admirably done, and looked as if 
 they were half- faded. " So they were,'* 
 §aid you, " when St. Clair threw them on 
 the table in the fishing-house." 
 
 And did Olivia deign to preserve, by 
 the magic of her pencil, those flowers 
 which the hand of St. Clair culled ? 
 
 *' Love," said you, " has its refinements ; 
 why should not friendship ?" Was it pos- 
 sible, my charming, my seducing friend, 
 to avoid mentioning my precious rose, 
 consecrated by the tear that fell from the 
 eye of Olivia ! I told you, you should see 
 this valued relic, and so you shall; you 
 shall see the identical leaf which your sen- 
 sibility embalmed ! you shall see that hap- 
 py flower, which once reposed upon your 
 breast, and should never have left mine 
 had its fragility permitted the indulgence ! 
 
 You must suffer me to see you to-day. 
 It is only at the Abbey I live; every 
 where else I may fairly class with the 
 genus zoophyte. When I see you in 
 the morning, the rest of the day passes 
 cheerily over. 
 
 *• Felice chi vi mira 
 
 Ma peu felice chi per voi sospira 
 
 Felicissima poi 
 
 Chi sosperando fa sospira voi.'' Guarini, 
 
 Ah ! Olivia, that were felicity indeed 1 
 
 a LETTER 
 
119 
 LETTER XXXir. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 How often since the commencement of 
 our little epistolary intercourse have I 
 wished for the herald crow of King Mar- 
 rhis ! how much oftener for the governor 
 of Damietta's carrier pigeon * ! but oh, 
 how much oftener still for the dove of 
 Anacreon, fittest courier for the sweetest 
 employ I could charge him with ! But when 
 once he had delivered my little billet to 
 thee, my sweet friend, who would ensure 
 me his return ? Oh yes ! you should repay 
 his labour by caresses, and he would re- 
 turn to me for a new task, that he might 
 obtain from thee a new reward. 
 
 I have been all this day reconnoilrmg the 
 
 fickle intentions of Lady L , to find 
 
 out if she visits the Abbey (as her car 
 riage has been ordered and countermanded 
 about twenty times since breakfast), in 
 order to enclose you a few chit chat lines 
 in a new publication, which I long to 
 send you ; but despairing of her rusting to 
 a poini until 
 
 " Some consequence still hanging in the stars'* 
 
 * Tasso, Canto v. 
 
 shall 
 
120 
 
 shall determine her Ladyship's weather- 
 cock mind, I apphcd to the gardener, 
 who I found was sending you a basket 
 of peaches, and who promised to have 
 my packet sent at the same time. You 
 will find in it a drawing for Tuscuhmij 
 and an mi perfect copy of Sarti's last song, 
 which I have executed wretchedly. How 
 could Rcusseau earn a livelihood by copying 
 music ? There is but one person on earth 
 for whom I would write a single bar. 
 
 Lord and Lady L spend to-morrow 
 
 with those formal mechanical creatures the 
 
 F s, whom 1 dislike (as theologists say 
 
 we should love Heaven) " with all viy soiil^ 
 iviih nil my mind, and with all my strength ;" 
 — will you suffer me to enjoy it, not to 
 s^md it, at the Abbey, where alone I can 
 
 " Far vita 
 
 Conforme a le mie voglie. 
 Oh! vera vita!" 
 
 How I shall long to hear your decision ! 
 Would that I could seat the gardener's boy 
 in Friar Bacons, flying chair 1 and yet if he 
 brings me your " Feto,'' I shall think he 
 returns too soon. 1 could not help ob- 
 serving in my walk home yesterday from 
 the Abbey, that though I made a circuit 
 of two unnecessary miles, and went round 
 by the park, though I paused and loitered 
 over every step (busied, pleasingly busied, 
 
 in 
 
I2t 
 
 m taking down in a kind of mental sliort- 
 hand all you saic/f and looked^ and d'ld)^ 
 yet I found m3sclf almost at the Castle 
 before I thought I had got half way ; and 
 yet when I was going lo you in the moriv 
 ing, though I almost flew across the fields, 
 still 
 
 " Every step sccm'd lengfhenM as I went ;" 
 
 and the goal of my impatient wishes to 
 recede, as \ approached it ! 
 
 This almost reconciles me to the luima- 
 ierial system of Berkley, that " nolh'ing is, 
 hut thinking viakes it so'' Astronomers 
 say tliat the planets recede slowly from \hc 
 sun, but precipitate their' motion when 
 returning towards their centre ; and I 
 greatly fear, my cliarming orh, that among 
 the many bodies which revolve round your 
 attractive influence, there is one whose 
 centrifugal lorce will be very inadequate 
 to retain him in his own sphere, or pre- 
 vent him from being lost in your iwrtex. 
 
 I love to speak to you in astronomical 
 allusion ; fori find that celestial metaphors 
 best illustrate a subject which is in itscU 
 divine ! 
 
 Does Captain M dine with you to- 
 morrow ? Do you know I think that man 
 obtains superiority over others merely 
 because he assumes it ? WelU *' on 7ie vaui 
 P / dans 
 
322 
 
 Jans ce monde que ce ^iie Voffveiif 'valo'ir'^' *'' 
 The indolence of mankind in this respect 
 is astonishing — how Oiany Caesars and 
 Alexanders I as it made ! " Assume a vir- 
 tue, thongh you have none," says Hamlet 
 to his mother: which advice I shall profit 
 hy this moment, and afreet a moderation 
 ] do not ieel, by terminating this attack 
 upon your patience and your time. Adieu, 
 
 i^ETTER XXXIlTo 
 
 ?ROM OLIVIA. 
 
 No^ my good friend ; you must not see 
 me to-morrow. We are to have a large 
 party of that description of people whose 
 souls, as the spirited CleDpalra of Conieille 
 says, 
 
 ** Le ciel ne forma que du bon." 
 
 Such society is not fit for you, and there 
 (as is frequently the case) you would be 
 " dark from excessive light. '" You must 
 indeed, you must resign the destiny of 
 our friendship into my hands; you are 
 too sanguine, too imprudent, lor the trust. 
 You must not come so frec|uent]y to the 
 
 * Briiyere. 
 
 Ahhey. 
 
 5 
 
X23 
 
 Abbey. Short absences, in friendship as in 
 love, not only " urge sweet return," but 
 refine its nature, and extend the posses- 
 sion of life. Montaigne says, with more 
 delicacy than he can generally boast of, 
 that " an unextinguishable desire for 
 personal presence implies weakness, in 
 the fruition of souls." Oh ! let us still 
 converse '' in spirit as in truth /" 
 
 Your astronomical hyperbole made me 
 smile- — however, I allow that if {-as philo- 
 sophers say) bodies attract in proportion 
 to their quantity of matter, my " attrac- 
 tive influence'' is hourly increasing; for 
 the studious and sedentary habits your 
 conversation and example have seduced mc 
 into, make a daily addition to my sped- 
 fie frravity ; and if -itvV were 
 
 -to be plac'd 
 
 In any set circumference of waist," 
 
 I should be glad to know the just cri- 
 terion, that I may realize fSivift's golden 
 maxim, and " know where to stop." 
 
 I believe Captain M does dine 
 
 here to-day. You are certainly prejudiced 
 against him, although you boast a *' pre- 
 judice against prejudices,^ 
 
 F a LETTER 
 
i:>4 
 
 LETTER XXXIV. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 So I am not to see yoii to-day ? You say 
 I oiight not — and what you say is to me 
 like the laws of the Medes and Persians I 
 You can make me believe what you please, 
 as Ariosio says, 
 
 -Far con tue pnrole 
 
 Creder che fosse oscure e Ireddo i] sole." 
 
 You have indeed made a considerable 
 progress in the science of en-bon- point 
 •since I first saw you, and it has not 
 lessened yonr attractive influence in a?iy 
 sense ; yet still you are a little creature, 
 and I never look at yon, that the " pic- 
 cioletfa Isabella'' of Tasso does Bot occur 
 to me ! 
 
 •' Ma pur gran meraviglia 
 I Fra tame cose picciole si vede 
 
 Che quti che remerando io sento al core 
 ^«on e piccioli ardure.'' 
 
 ** The most obvious point," sa} s Bnrke, 
 *' that presents itself to us on examining 
 any object, is itsextentand quantity ; and 
 what degree of extent prevails in bodies 
 that are held beautiful may be gatliered 
 
 froni 
 
125 
 
 from the usual manner of expression used 
 concerning it." I, however, lor the future! 
 will render the Criterion less indefinite, 
 and make you my slandard. So Captain 
 
 M dines wkh you to-day ? Well, " ihis 
 
 'world was made for Caesar !" — yet I will 
 venture to assert I shall enjoy more of your 
 society this evening than he will ; for 
 
 '' Have I not seen thee where thou hast not been?'* 
 
 LETTER XXXV.. 
 
 FROM OLlVLir 
 
 Is it possible, that ray not speaking to 
 
 vou at ]\Irs. F 's th.e other evening:, 
 
 when I was surrounded by a crowd, and 
 went away so early, could have caused 
 your absence, and given vou such serious 
 uneasiness as your note* of this morning 
 implies ? 
 
 " The soul intent on offices of love, 
 
 Will oft neglect or scovn tne weaker proof 
 
 Which smiles or wordb can give." 
 
 Apply this sentiment to friendship^ and 
 then be sulk)' it you dare. Ah ! my good 
 
 * Which does not appear. 
 
 p J friend. 
 
126 
 
 friend, you know little of the heart of a 
 woman, if you suppose the man she ap- 
 pears to notice least is always the most 
 jnclhfftrcnt to her. Taught to conceal our 
 feelings from our cradles, a species of co- 
 quetry insinuates itself insensibly into our 
 most moderate sentiments; and, like a 
 wily enemy, we embrace those stratagems 
 \vc early learn to believe are constantly in 
 agitation against ourselves 1 I, however, 
 was educated upon no hackneyed princi- 
 ples ; and as I am consequently free from 
 the general prejudices of my sex, I am 
 exempt from all those little finesses which 
 are inimical to the candour and dignity 
 of an ingenuous mind : how then ought I 
 to treat the scepticism you have betrayed 
 to the faith of that friendship 1 have pos- 
 sessed for you ? 
 
 Apostate that you are ! should I grant 
 you a plenary indulgence for all past he- 
 resies, will you promise for the future in- 
 violable fidelity ? Seriously, however, yoir 
 are too refined, too tastidious in your no- 
 tions of attention and ncfilect . Providence, 
 in eiKJowing you with the most precious 
 gifts, has given an equilibrium to the ba- 
 lance, by giving you immoderate sensibi- 
 lity: it certainly may exalt your joys ; but 
 in audition to tliube ills VN'hich " flesh is 
 heir to," it torments you vvith many self- 
 created evils. 1 have been paying a bridal 
 
 visit 
 
12 7 
 
 visit to-day at the town of S >, and 
 
 spent a wretched hour in the midst of a 
 convention of gossips. Tlie society ot these 
 great villages is insufferable; and, gene- 
 rally speaking, a country town is tlie very 
 emporium of scandal, prejudices, and ilii- 
 bcrality. The ideas of the inhabitants, 
 narrowed to the limitation of their spliere 
 of action, and their sentiments of mankind, 
 are gatlicred from the characteristieal trails 
 of the individuals of their own little circle ; 
 it is very ditHeult to converse with these 
 sort of folk with any degree of patience or 
 tempc^r ; everything they do not under- 
 stand they laugli at or condemn, and 
 that is every thing beyond the literal com- 
 mon-place tacts of their own contracted 
 system — or, 
 
 " Tous ces riens qui remplifienl leurs cceurs." 
 
 There was an old goody in th.e group 
 this morning, who has taken it into her 
 head that I have run away with Captain 
 
 M from her grand-daughtt-r (for he is 
 
 silly enough to shew the poetical trifles he 
 writes at the Abbey to the Misses of 
 
 S ■), and who therefore attempted 
 
 to be very splenetic on the subjects of. 
 " reading, music, poetry, and all such 
 stuff." She was immediately joined by th.e 
 whole juntO; and it was as immediately 
 F 4 carried, 
 
12» 
 
 earned, nem. con. that poetry was all ro- 
 mance and folly ; that all poets and poet- 
 esses were starved to death, and that they 
 should thank Heaven none of their girls 
 were geniuses. There they made a di- 
 gression, of which yon had the honour to 
 be the siil^jcct — you were at the assembly 
 
 last night with Lady L , and danced 
 
 wi(h the beautiful Miss A : Miss 
 
 A has a great fortune, and you 
 
 were in great spirits — and " thereby hangs 
 a tale." 
 
 So much for the pining solicitude of 
 friendsliip ! Ah, liypocrite ! the Misses 
 of S think you monstrously interest- 
 ing ; so melancholy, so pensive, they said 
 too: but It is of no consequence what 
 
 they said. I always return iVom S • 
 
 as peevish as a spoiled child; and yet I 
 am ready to laugh at myself too, for being 
 irritated by the silly prattle of people I de- 
 spise. The truth is, like yourself, 1 am 
 miserably fastidious with respect to society. 
 Early initiated into ail tlic pleasures of a 
 refined and elegant intercourse, it taught 
 me to select n^y friends from the worthy 
 and the intelligent, and to detect the ig- 
 norance, vapidity, and self-sufficiency of 
 those mechanical beings who frecjucntly 
 constitute llie aggregate of society. I'his 
 power of discrimination was perhaps a fatal 
 gift; it has worn the attractive gloss off 
 
 the 
 
129 
 
 the surface of what is temped genteel com- 
 ])nny, and discovered the apparent diamond 
 to be a mere pebble. If you will ramble 
 over to the Abbey this evening, yon will 
 meet a few of the few 1 know you like. 
 
 Is the Miss A so very beautiful ? 
 
 How came you to dance ? I never law you 
 dance; I liate dancing men — so did Mi- 
 chal ; for when she saw the viclonous mo- 
 narch Icapingand dancing, " she despised 
 him in heart." 1 idolize her spirited irony, 
 to David !. 
 
 LETTER XXXVI. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. - 
 
 I WAS indeed weak enough to feel sen^ 
 sibly (too sensibly) your apparent neglect, 
 and yet I am not so refined in these mat- 
 ters as you seem, to suppose ; but it is cer- 
 tain, that in any sentiment excited by you, 
 Lean preserve no moderation. A faithful 
 barometer is not more influenced by the 
 variation of the weather, than I am by the 
 different degrees of heat or cold apparent 
 in your manners. My pctulancy, how- 
 ever, on this subject scarcely deserves the 
 name of sensibility, v/ith which you honour 
 it ; though, it is true, my immoderate sus- 
 F 5 ceptibility 
 
13© 
 
 cepfiljility to happiness is more {ban coun- 
 terpoised by the opposite extreme of feel- 
 ing which follows the destruction of my too 
 sanguinely formed hopes. Your friend- 
 ship is too areat, too unmerited a blessing 
 n(U to be cherished by a thousand lively 
 and tender appreliensions for the stability 
 gf its existence; and, to contess the truth, 
 yon ofler it to me with so playful a negli- 
 gence, so careless an air, that I fear I shall 
 sometipjc^ have to say with the poet, 
 
 " Le ZepI yre fut teinoln, I'onde fut attentive, 
 Q^aiid Ja ir, niphe jiira de ne changer jamais; 
 Mais ie Zf|.'hyre iegcre, et I'onde fugitive 
 Oiu b. en-tot tmpone ses serixents qireile a fait." 
 
 But away with heresy and schism! Hence- 
 forth 1 rerouncc all apoetacy, and shall vie 
 in the steadiness of my faith with the most 
 supcistitious devotee that ever assumed the 
 scapu'ary ; hut i tear, ihat, like St, Austin, 
 ] shall force myself to b( iieve some things 
 merely because they are impossihlc : '■ Credo 
 quia mfossib'iJe eslT And, my charming 
 friend, 1 must believe tiiat I hold some 
 plare in the " iinjolruted temple of thy mind" 
 were it only to account for the enviable 
 privileges 1 enjoy; as vi'e receive the Co- 
 fermran system, if not for lis demonstra- 
 tion^ at least lor the various pJa-nomena it 
 accounts fur. It is ccrtam, that " our 
 doubts arc traitors, and m.ake us lose the 
 
 good 
 
131 
 
 good we oft might win, by fearing to at- 
 tempt ;" yet I tear I have been but too 
 venturous. I never had but one opinion 
 with respect to the saciefy you mention, 
 and vou have defined ir ; but I can scarce- 
 ly believe it possible, that any thing such 
 people can say, could give you a moment's 
 uneasiness. You must be conscious that 
 merit and superiority su.h as yours, like 
 the pahn-tree, rises in proportion to the 
 efforts that are made to depress it. Cap- 
 tain M 's attentions at the Ao!)ey are 
 
 certainly too obvious to escape t'le prying 
 eye of idle curiosity: he is doubtless a 
 man of some talent, and yet I think 
 rather attects the sentiments of sentiment, 
 than possesses its sjul. I have met v\'ilh 
 many such men ; however, he is a fa- 
 vourite of yours, and that circumstance 
 makes his eulogium ! 
 
 It is true, I was at the assembly of 
 
 S last niglit, and found it pleasant 
 
 enough ; but it is also true, that though 
 the heart should extend the circle of its 
 pleasures, it may still preserve the central 
 point of supreme happiness undiminished ; 
 as the chord of sympathy, which nature 
 twines round the souls of kindred beings, 
 though it a>ay give with elasticiiy to the 
 pressure of circumstances, will yet seek 
 with added force its native bias. 
 
 Mi£;S A is very bcauliful, and so is 
 
 f 6 Miss 
 
132 
 
 Miss B , and Miss C , and so on 
 
 through the whole alphabet of loveliness ; 
 but, to confess the truth, 
 
 '* Their beauty serves but as a note, 
 Remembering me, who pass'd that passing fair." 
 
 1 bhall certainly meet the few of the few 
 this evening; shall we not have coffee in 
 the little Tusculum — where 
 
 " La liberte convive aimable, 
 IMets les deux couds sur la table r" 
 
 Voltaire. 
 
 There, and there only, is tins charming 
 picture of sociality truly realized. 
 
 I cannot tell you why I danced the 
 other ni^ht ; 1 believe I did it, as one 
 does many silly things, for want of some- 
 thing better to do. I once fell in love 
 ^•pon this principle : but I swear to you, 
 never to dance while I live ; though St. 
 Basil of Limoges (the only saint 1 can 
 find in the calendar, who patronizes dan- 
 cing) were to return to earth, to enlist m,e 
 for a cotillion..— Adieu, — till this evening. 
 
 LETTER 
 
133 
 LETTER XXXVIL 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 When: EVER yon return me anv of wf 
 books. I run up to my room, loc k myself 
 in, and go over every volume page by 
 page, in the hope of meeting some little 
 pencil stroke, sonie little marginal observ- 
 ation, v^'hich marks the purity of your 
 taste or the strength of your judgment, 
 and renders the book, ever alter, invalu- 
 able in my eyes. While your packet of 
 this morning was undergoing the usual 
 inquisitorial examination, sometlimg fell 
 from beneath the leaves of Zimmerman ; 
 it was the little purse of purple and silver 
 I had seen you employed about some time 
 back, with your cipher interwoven in it 
 with your hair. Zimmerman was always 
 my favourite ; think you he is less so now } 
 I have tiianked him a thousand and a 
 Thousand times, and vowed as often never 
 to part with him ; yet I cannot thank you, 
 Olivia 1 but could I offer to you the same 
 vow I have done to him, with the same 
 certainty of its performance — gracious 
 God ! 
 
 Do you remember, one evening when 
 your necklace gave way, as you were 
 
 dancing 
 
134 
 
 dancing with so much grace and spirit, . 
 your national dance, how busy I was, in 
 gathering your scattered treasures : you 
 never suspected my peculation, and I re- 
 turned iiomc, rich with the fruit of my 
 dishonesty. From that raotTicnt these lit- 
 tle beads have been as valualjie to me as 
 any thrice- blessed rosary ever was to its 
 catholic possessor. I have consigned these 
 relics to your purse, which is alone wor- 
 thy of the deposit ; and the heart which 
 now palpitates against them, values these 
 precious gifts, in proportion to the senti- 
 ments it treasures for the charming giver. 
 
 An<i now, my sweet friend, you cannot 
 in justice refuse to accept a little g^li^'S 
 d'amkie, which is, suffer me to say, not 
 unworthy of the object to whom it is 
 offered ; it is a small Florence edition of 
 the " Paul el Fu-girue'' of Saint Pierre — 
 Samt Pierre, who wrote only to such 
 hearts and such imaginations as Olivia's ; 
 and who can alone be rightly understood 
 by ihosc minds, which, like hers, have with 
 an impulse, an energy almost divine, 
 iiung off tlie shackles with which igno- 
 rance, error, and prejudice had loaded 
 then), and flown to seek the source of 
 truth, under tije guidance of nature. 
 
 When I received your little present this 
 morning, linvokintarily exclaimed, " Uam- 
 hre ne refaad pas un farfum aujfi doux que 
 
 ies 
 
^35 
 
 Jcs ohjels touches par Vohjet que Von aime^^ 
 My heart found expression for its feelings 
 through the medium of my memory; and 
 botli stood indebted to a work which at 
 that moment I conceived a worthy offer- 
 ing to Olivia — will she not be propitious ? 
 I love these little mutual pledges; they are 
 so many additional fibres to the great bond 
 that unites two minds which nature has 
 organized upon similar principles. Adieu I 
 May " Faul el Virghne''' sometimes recall 
 to your mind one who will never cease to 
 cherish in his the most piiofound venera- 
 tion for your virtues, and the liveliest, 
 the tenderest rccolUction of the kindness 
 with which you have honoured him ! 
 
 LETTER XXXVIII. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 You think then, my good friend, that a 
 *' ^^2^ d'amitle'" is requisite in such a con- 
 nexion as ours : my heart never felt the 
 necessity; and my memory continually 
 furnishes me w'lih crages d\miities of those 1 
 esteem. 1 accept, however, your present; 
 it shall be to me all that you wish it-; a 
 memento which shall restore to me in idea 
 those hours enriched by your society, and 
 
 in 
 
136 
 
 in which I felt, In its fullest force, the 
 simple and touching assertion of Ossian, 
 
 *' Jio^v pleafciut was my friend /" 
 
 LETTER XXXIX. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 Olivia, my sweet friend, I implpre, I 
 supplicate you to assist me against your- 
 self: it is^i^\]i(|i onl}^ that can he opposed 
 to OHv1a, and she alone can counteract 
 the evils of which she alone is the cause. 
 Evils did I call them ? Alas! are not all 
 pleasures which are transient, though ex- 
 quisite, evils the most refined and danger- 
 ous ? their blissful existence scarcely ex- 
 tends beyond the period of their birlh. 
 But through how man ' dull and wretched 
 liours is the heart doomed to beat, that 
 treasures the recollections of the joys it 
 once revelled in, and pines in unceasing 
 sorrow over their premature dissolution ! 
 Alas ! to such a heart, life is a blank, and 
 the world a desert. " See," said you to 
 me, the other day in the garden, pointing 
 to a withered stem, " that beautiful 
 flower we so much admired, has shed its 
 last leaf; but these thorns survive the fra- 
 grant blossom whose fragility they guard- 
 ed." 
 
137 
 
 cd." I could not help drawing a simili- 
 tude at tlie moment — and 1 fear it was 
 prophetic. Oh ! OHvia, the supreme hap- 
 piness your friendship and society liave 
 enriched me with, greatly as I feel, greatly 
 as 1 estimate t!iem, could not compensate 
 for the horrors of that moment which shall 
 convince rne that the ties which cemented 
 our friendship, exist only with me ; yet a 
 thousand little inadvertencies on your part, 
 a thousand well-founded anxieties on 
 mine, tell me that moment is not far off, 
 when the cold forms of worldly etiquette 
 shall be subslituted by indifference for that 
 cordial and delicious intercourse which 
 knew no reserve but what the refinement 
 of sentiment insinuated ; no restriction 
 but what timidity on one part, and respect, 
 even to idolatry, on the other, imposed. 
 
 Last night! — Olivia! did you know the 
 tender and pleasing emotions that ani- 
 mated rae, during my walk to the Abbey, 
 last night ! You bid me put Metaslasio in 
 my pocket : I had done so, and marked 
 down several passages that we would read 
 and pause over together ; (how I love 
 such pauses!) and my heart and imagina- 
 tion revelled in a thousand liltle antici- 
 pated delights, which faded info air as I 
 entered your drawing-room. I found you 
 surrounded by a crowd ; delighted and 
 delighting ; more beautiful, indeed, than 
 
 1 had 
 
138 
 
 I bad ever seen you, and more brilliant 
 than I had ever wished to Ice you. 
 
 1 had talked for near half an hour to 
 the younger Miss D (without, Hea- 
 ven knows, understanding a word that 
 cither of us said) before you seemed la 
 notice me; and then I was only included 
 in the nod ai:id the smile you bestowed on 
 that young Ensign I know you despise: 
 the next moment, however, he was at 
 your side, and you appeared to laugh with 
 all your heart at some ridiculous nonsense 
 he was repeatrng to you ; while I, unno- 
 ticed, took refuge in a corner of the room ; 
 where, probably, 1 might have remained 
 for the rest of the evening, iiad f not been 
 wanted to take a part in that Italian glee 
 
 which Captain M admires so much, 
 
 and which I think so wretched a compo- 
 sition : tliis, indeed, procured me some 
 little notice; yet it only rendered me the 
 subject of that playful raillery which you 
 manage v.'ith such excjuisite skill, and 
 which heals so sweetly the wounds it m- 
 fiicts. But was it fair, my gay friend, to 
 poitit out to public observation, a vveak- 
 jiess of which you well knew yourself the 
 cause? It was true, indeed, as you remark- 
 ed, that I \\i\s not '• most musical," tiiough 
 *' most melancholy ;" for I was as little 
 
 inclined to sing, as to bear Captain M 's 
 
 clumsy attempts at sarcasm : that I did 
 
 cither 
 
cither was owing to you : I could not re- 
 fuse a request which j'ou condescended to 
 make; nor could I resent a conduct which 
 you seemed to sanction. 
 
 Oh, my dear friend ! let me again im- 
 plore you to assist me against yourself. 
 Send me no more of these bewitching in- 
 vitations, or teach me to support the effects 
 they produce. Think me at least, Olivia, 
 worthy of your poinded neglect; whatever 
 sentiment I excite, let it have some energy 
 — some character : but the gay indiffer- 
 ence with which you treat me, the laugh- 
 ing ease with which you receive and dis- 
 miss me, that indiscriminate equality of 
 manner with which you level me to the 
 inconsequent beings of an every day's ac- 
 quaintance, desolate me; I cannot sup- 
 port it — I must be the friend of Olivia, 
 or nothing ; her acquaintance I will not 
 be! ' 
 
 Restore to me, then, the Olivia I once 
 knev/, 
 
 " Mv long-soueht other self, 
 
 The wish exactly to my heart's desire." 
 
 Restore to me that air of pensive lan- 
 guor ; that touching softness, which 
 breathes the very soul of sentiment, and 
 diffuses a charm around you, not to be 
 conceived, and never to be felt with im- 
 punity ; restore to me yourself, or banish 
 me from you for ever ! 
 
 LETTER 
 
140 
 
 LETTER XL. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 Hence vain deluding joys. 
 
 The brood of Folly, witliout father brcJ, 
 
 How little you bestead, 
 
 Or till the mir.d with all your toys! 
 
 But hail ! thou goddess s:ij^e and holy, 
 
 Hail, divinest Melancholy ! 
 
 Had It not been for your Ip.st epistle^ 
 " most potent, grave, and reverend Sig- 
 iior," it is ten to one hut I liad nddtd 
 to the list of RaveslU!^ T;-!Xter, and de- 
 parted this life in a lit of laughter : not 
 tliat I was ignorant, that Swift anathema- 
 tized tiie faintest indieatioti of a laugh, as 
 a hcrrsy against common sense ; and my 
 Lord Chesterfield, as a solecism in the sys- 
 tem of politesse. Yet I considered thcsG 
 interdictions as only extending to sages 
 and pe/ils mnitres, and never once con- 
 ceived, that the playful spirit of a cheerful 
 wotnan could mihtate even against the 
 sentiiiuT.tal dignity of a Laura or an He- 
 loise. But vour letter has shewn me the 
 full extent of my error ; and I have al- 
 ready abjured 
 
 " Nods, and becks, and wreathed smile^," 
 
 which 
 
141 
 
 which should alone give play to the risihlc 
 muscles of '' fat, contented Jfinorance." 
 When you again come to the Abbey, then 
 
 *' With even step, and musing gait," 
 
 you shall find I will meet you, 
 
 " Sober, stedfast, and demure." 
 
 My good friend, trust me, there is no- 
 thin<z; in this lite worth a serious thouo^ht ; 
 and still more, there are many things 
 in it wc cannot think seriously on with 
 impunity ; and perhaps the first fruits of 
 my gravity would be to terminate a con- 
 «exion, which 
 
 St. Clair, you must drop this subject for 
 €ver ! Friendship has no riglit to mtrude 
 on the jealous delicacies of love. 
 
 LETTER XLI. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 " I oftliad heard, but ne'er believ'd till now, 
 There are who can, by potent magic spells, 
 Bend to their crooked purpose, nature's law," 
 
 In short, I must tell you, my dangerous 
 friend, in plain prose, that I look upon 
 you to be as complete a witch, as any 
 
 that 
 
142 
 
 that has appeared since Saul's partial ex- 
 termination of the weird sisterhood ; not 
 excepting tiie witch of Endor, Joan of 
 Arc, or tlie Dutchess of Beaufort herself * ; 
 far I feel, that, by the influence of your 
 art, you have not only in " sweet mad- 
 ness robbed me of myself," but taught 
 me to cherish the spell which binds me, 
 and to dread the sober certainty of that 
 returning reason your sorcery has put to 
 flight. Every thing I hear, every thing I 
 sec, is impregnated with Olivia ; and her 
 idea, like the fragrance exhaled from the 
 beard of Aaron, extends to every object 
 within its sphere. " Pray, Sir," said a 
 i^rave and erudite personage to me, yes- 
 terday after dinner, " is Livy a favourite 
 of yours ?" 
 
 " Gracious Heaven ! what a question!'* 
 said I, starting from my chair, and co- 
 louring to the eyes. The poor man drew 
 back in the utmost consternation, and a 
 general smile circulated round the table. 
 My inquisitor, who had been discussing 
 the merits of the Roman authors of the 
 Augustan day, alluded to Livy the histo- 
 rian ; but to me, there was but one Livy 
 in the universe. And the other evening, 
 when a young pedant fresh from the aca- 
 
 * Supposed to have entered into a compact with 
 the devil, to secure the affections of Henry IV, 
 
 demic 
 
•143 
 
 demic shades, was astonishing the ladles 
 
 sit Mr. T 's, by displaying his classic 
 
 treasures, to vindicate the moderation of 
 modern luxury, by opposing to it that of 
 the ancients, and ransacking the Forinian, 
 Putcolan, Baian, and Cumasan shores, to 
 strengthen his position ; then unfortu- 
 nately touching on the Ciceronian vilias, 
 the wordTusculum caught my ear: it was 
 like a shock of electricity ! and, by un- 
 fortunately losing the original idea in the 
 association it awakened, I led my learned 
 declaimer a dance, from the Appian Way 
 to your little Tusculum on the shores of 
 the lake of Desmond ; where he seemed 
 very glad to slip through my fingers, with 
 the tirm belief, I fancy, that he had been 
 wasting a very erudite oration upon as 
 insane an auditor as ever wielded an ima- 
 ginary sceptre in the dominions of Bedlam. 
 These, however, are only two instances 
 out of a thousand, of the extraordinary 
 effects you have produced in me ; and 
 now, as I am certain an influence so un- 
 bounded could never have been effected 
 according to the common course of events 
 or fitness of things, 1 can only attribute it 
 to the power of witchcraft, which the 
 scepticism of modern reason attempts to 
 deny, in despite of sacred authority ; biit 
 of which, from fatal experience, I no 
 longer entertain a doubt. Having there- 
 fore 
 
144 
 
 fore msted to a point, I have delermined 
 o.i coiiimciicing a lively prosecution against 
 you, according to the letter of the law, 
 for " witchcraft, conjuration, enchant- 
 ment, and sorcery." 1 liave read, with 
 great care, the learned Howel upon " the 
 Existence of Witches ;" thumbed over 
 the Capitularies of Charlen:iagne, and 
 the Canons of several councils, which 
 have touched on the crime and its punish- 
 ment ; waded through Coke upon Lyttle- 
 ton, PufFendorft, and Bracton,, in the hope 
 of new discoveries; and have just set sail 
 for Biackstone's Commentaries, with an 
 anxiety equally ardent in the same cause. 
 
 I find tliat the Mosaic law commands 
 lis " not to suffer a witch to live ;'* and 
 is so far surpassed by the civil, that, ac- 
 cording to statute 33 of Henry VI;I. all 
 enchantment is declared iohe felony, with- 
 out the lencfit of clergy. However, my 
 animosity outsteps not the boundaries of 
 existence ; and provided I have the satis- 
 faction to see you punished (for your ini- 
 quitous intcr<ourse with supernatural 
 agents to the destruction of your species) 
 in this world, I care not how elevated a 
 seat, or how tunable a harp, you obtain 
 among the choir of " simpering angels" 
 in the next. 
 
 However, as you may skreen yourself 
 from my fury, by claiming the right of 
 
 every 
 
Hi; 
 
 fcvery British subject, of being tried bjf 
 your peers (which I confess arc not to h6 
 found on earth), I intend to move, that 
 you may be tried according to the old 
 Brehon laws of your country ; the simple 
 law of retaliation, an eye for an eye, a 
 heart for a heart : then shall you burn ill 
 flames as ardent as those in which yoa 
 have consumed so many others ; every 
 spell by which you have infatuated the 
 senses of mankind shall enthral your 
 own ; and every pang you have excited in 
 the bosoms of your fellow-creatures shall 
 rankle with added poignancy in yours. I 
 have just too discovered, that a statute 
 of James I. is particularly severe on all 
 those who attempt ^' to provoke love by 
 sorcery ;" decreeing imprisonment for the 
 first, and death for the second offence : 
 but, as the number of your offences, of 
 this nature, possibly exceed the power of 
 human calculation, you should be tied 
 for life to the unfortunate victim on whom 
 you had executed your " black art"vvith 
 most success ; and, in your turn, feel for 
 him all that you had forced him, and 
 others, to feel for you ! 
 
 For my own part, I would very will- 
 ingly myself be this instrument of retri- 
 bution in the hands of Providence, if, by 
 my heroic and voluntary immolation, I 
 should secure the preservation of the rest 
 
 G of 
 
146 
 
 of my species. I believe I should never 
 have been irritated to this refined and un- 
 common vengeance, had not your witch- 
 craft and malignity appeared more obvious 
 last night than 1 ever remember them ; 
 your air, your manner, your voice, your 
 dress, nay, even your smiles and attitudes, 
 were all equally indicative of one " re- 
 nowned for magic arts ;" 
 
 *' - Who look'd not like the inhabitant 
 Of the earth, and yet was on it." 
 
 And, to me at least, you appeared more 
 potent and more dangerous in the midst 
 of your magic circle, than the Canidia 
 of Horace, the Circe of Virgil, the He- 
 cate of Shakespear, or even the Fairy 
 Queen of Spenser. To give you, how- 
 ever, some chance for escaping the pu- 
 nishment which awaits you, I swear to 
 you, 
 
 *' By Cupid's strongest bow. 
 
 By his best arrow with the golden head, 
 
 By the simplicity of Venns' doves," 
 
 or any more appropriate oath you may 
 please to dictate, that I will withdraw my 
 suit ; provided, in this general war which 
 you wage against mankind, you will grant 
 a partial armistice in my favour, and draw 
 up such terms of pacification as I can sign 
 with honour : let a mutual concession seal 
 I the 
 
^47 
 the treaty ; restore me my happy exemp. 
 tlon from bliss or from despair, my apathy, 
 my tranquillity, my indifference, and the 
 small, the very small portion of common 
 sense I possessed before 
 
 *' You touch'd the freedom of my mind 
 With all your charms ;" 
 
 and I, in return, will cede — ah ! no ; I 
 have nothing of yours to restore ; no 
 spoil to boast of, but the rich plunder of 
 your justly estimated friendship ! and I 
 would not resign that treasure for the re- 
 storation of all you have deprived me of; 
 nor even for less than what you have not 
 to bestow, and of which a more success- 
 ful enemy has already possessed himself. 
 
 LETTER XLII. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 •' On the comer of the moon 
 
 Hangs a vaporous drop profound ; 
 I '11 catch it ere it comes to ground ; 
 Which, distill'd by magic slights. 
 Shall raise such artiBcial sprites," 
 
 That your host of malicious ii teition 6 
 
 «hall retire before my supernatiral pha- 
 
 G a lanx : 
 
148 
 
 lanx : in short, your threatened prosecu- 
 tion has roused the energies of my art ; 
 and, while you point against me the whole 
 artillery of the Law and the Gospel, I 
 fulminate against you all those witcheries, 
 under whose faintest exertions you already 
 tremble. You know not how much you 
 stand exposed to my fury ; while I (se- 
 cured in the gallant clemency of him who 
 protected that enchantment, whose in- 
 fluence he owned in the talismanic eyes 
 of beauty *) can " call up spirits from 
 the vasty deep," to revenge the insult 
 thrown on my power ; not, however, that 
 I should wish to shun legal investiga- 
 tion, since, like ore tried in the crucible, 
 I should only make " assurance doubly 
 sure," and force my judges to feel that 
 power they dare to circumscribe, and 
 punish still with all the seducing wiles of 
 my art : 
 
 " Winding me into the easy-hearted men. 
 To hug them in my snares." 
 
 So entirely, therefore, do I defy your 
 malignant endeavours, and so utterly do 
 I renounce your otFer and your oath, that 
 I even conjure your attendance on my 
 
 * Louis the Fourteenth, who restrained the tri- 
 bunals of justice from receiving informations of 
 witchcraft. 
 
 will 
 
149 
 
 will to-morrow evening, in the name of 
 all that poetry and music can confer ; in 
 the name of Ossian and of Carolan, and 
 by the magic smile of the woman you 
 most love. Then, trembling amidst the 
 mysteries of my orgies, you shall your- 
 self be witness to the solemn incantation 
 which makes that "charm firm and good," 
 that binds you the victim of my art for 
 ever. 
 
 LETTER XLIII. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 < Irresistible and omnipotent enchant- 
 ress, though 
 
 " Thou wert girt v.'ith 
 
 All the grisly legions that troop 
 
 Under the sooty toot of Acheron j 
 
 Harpies and hydras, or all the monstrous forms 
 
 *Twixt Africa and Ind," 
 
 I'll meet thee in thy cave of mysteries, 
 and at thy feet will vow by all the magic 
 lurking in thine eyes, by all the enchant- 
 ment breathing in thy voice, by all the 
 spells that wait upon thy smiles, to be the 
 willing victim of thy art for ever and 
 ever! till the delightful bondage incorpo- 
 rates with eternity. 
 
 G 2 LETTER 
 
150 
 
 LETTER XLIV. 
 
 What ! you complain of my silence ! 
 My dearest friend, I never loved, never 
 esteemed you more than at this moment ; 
 but the fact is, 1 never entered into a more 
 interesting correspondence — and Olivia's 
 little notes of a dozen lines are more 
 valuable in my eyes than the letters of 
 Pliny or the epistles of Cicero; but this 
 fascinating correspondence is at an end ; 
 like all my other pleasures, it was lively 
 and transient. Olivia and her grandfa- 
 ther dined here to-day : while I was shew- 
 ing her a book of botanical drawings, 
 and the rest of the laJies were seated at 
 cards, slie took an opportunity to slip a 
 paper into my hand ; I withdrew with as 
 much impatience to peruse it, as if I were 
 a thousand miles distant from her — it ran 
 as follows : 
 
 *' I have to chide you, my dear friend : 
 " I am told that you speak of me every 
 *' where, and to every one, in a manner 
 *' very inconsistent with the moderation 
 *' of friendship. Know ine better, and you 
 " will praise me less, and do not expose 
 *' the character of your tnste and judg- 
 " ment, where alone they can he question- 
 *' ed with justice. Ah ! St. Clair, do not 
 
 '' think 
 
*' think I am insensible to the full value 
 " of your applause : it is from a principle 
 *' of equity, as well as of prudence, that 
 *' I refuse myself a gratification I know 
 *' I do not deserve, and feel it is dangerous 
 *' to encourage. Ill-nature is ever ready 
 *' to lend her voice to the fabrications of 
 *' scandal, and our little correspondence 
 " has been noticed. I am as much above 
 *' unfounded censure as any one, but I 
 *' cannot conceal that 1 am hart and mor- 
 *' tified ; write to me therefore no more, 
 " my dear friend. If we would live in the 
 " world, we must in some respect livs 
 "with it. Do not think, hov^ever, that 
 *' I mean to relinquish your friendship ; it 
 •' is no longer in my power. Your talents, 
 *' your character, your virtues, the inter- 
 *' cstinor melancholy of your appearance, 
 *' and the va;>!d and uncongenial society 
 " in which destiny had thrown you, from 
 ** the earliest |>eriod of our acquaintance 
 '' awakened every secret source of sympa- 
 " thy in my bosom ; and my mind, ever 
 *' on the stretch to seek its kindred asso- 
 " ciate, glanced eagerly into the perspec- 
 *' tive of that tfiendship, which, independ- 
 " eiit and disinterested, sliould have its 
 *' basis in sentiment and esteem, and rear 
 *' irs supreme point of elevation under the 
 *' sacred guidance of virtue and honour, 
 " My father early taught me to cultivate 
 G 4 ' the 
 
152 
 
 the friendship of men of genius and 
 worth, in preference to my own sex. 
 Such was the principle upon which I 
 sought your friendship. Your diffidenccj 
 your reserve, and my own timidity, al- 
 most stifled our infant connexion in the 
 first moments of its existence. But the 
 reserve of temperament or habit, when 
 opposing, on a first introduction, the 
 union of congenial minds, may not 
 be unaptly compared to the chill mist 
 which obscures the radiance of the 
 rising sun : the maturity of day dis- 
 pels it, and the orb rises on the eye 
 of nature in all its majesty. It is thus 
 the soul unfolds its powers, as the mists 
 of diffidence and customs evaporate, and 
 leave it to the full exertion of its facul- 
 ties. It is true, I am the mistress, I 
 might almost say, the wife of the first 
 elected object of my heart ; but I never 
 shall cease to be the unalterable friend 
 of St. Clair : and though the vv'isest of 
 philosophers, Confucius, has declared, 
 * that we must change often, to be con- 
 stant in happiness or wisdom,' yet I 
 hope, from the stabihty of our con- 
 nexion, to make an hourly acquisition 
 in both." 
 
 ANSWER. 
 
153 
 
 ANSWER. 
 
 *^ It is yourself, my inestimable, my 
 "' charming friend, it is yourself, you 
 " should assimilate to that orbvvhoseattri- 
 " bute you display in the effects you have 
 *' produced on me. You have warmed 
 " my feelings into life; you have given 
 *' me a new sense of existence ; you have 
 *' ngurished those gems which drooped 
 *' for the genial glow that was denied 
 " them, and have revived those spirits 
 *' which were frozen in the apathy of dis- 
 ^' appointment. I will obey you, Olivia, 
 " for 1 will be silent. Not to realize the 
 " dearest wish of ray soul, would 1 sully 
 ** the purity of your name, or profane the 
 " sanctity of your character: 1 am artless 
 *' and unsophisticated, unable to conceal 
 " my feelings, nor hitherto feeling aught 
 " I should blush to reveal. To reflect on 
 *' your virtues, was the favourite occupa- 
 *' tion of my heart — how natural then, 
 *' that my lips should adopt a similar 
 *' theme 1 But if it is as criminal to think 
 " on your perfections, as to expatiate on 
 ** them, I honestly confess to you, my 
 ** crime can only terminate with my ex- 
 " istence. It is true, Olivia, you are ' the 
 "• mistress, the wife of the first elected 
 " object of your heart :' that is a circum- 
 G 5 . ** stance 
 
^' stance you did not wish me to forget, 
 " nor shall I. I have ever ' held you as 
 " a thing enskied ;' and vv'hen yoa tell St. 
 " Clair you are his friend, you ennoble him 
 *' in his own opinion beyond all the frivo- 
 " lous honours rankcouldconfer, or world- 
 *•' ly elevation endow him with. If such are 
 '' the emotions your friendship can excite, 
 ** what then must he feel, who possesses 
 *' your love ! Ah, Olivia ! as these are 
 ** the last lines which I shall probably be 
 " permitted to address to you. I would 
 " fain prolong the gratification ; but your 
 *' carriage is at the door, and I fear to 
 " miss the only opportunity that may cc- 
 *' cur, of delivering you those sentiments, 
 ** which I hope will silence your appre- 
 *' hen^ions, and be the best security for the 
 *' circumspection of my future conduct.'* 
 
 Such, as well as I can recollect, was 
 the incoherent answer I returned to her 
 letter: hitherto I v.as a stranger to the 
 feelings of my owr^ heart. My hopes and 
 my wishes were vague, undefinable, and 
 uncertain ; my ideas were lost in contu- 
 sion, and my soul resigned itself involun- 
 tarily to the delightful ruin that over- 
 whelmed it. That Olivia was to be the 
 wife of my relation, 1 knew — but the na- 
 ture of her attachment to him, I never 
 trusted myself to think on. The deliruira, 
 
 however. 
 
however, is over. Olivia esteems me, and 
 loves another; she has explicitly de- 
 fined her sentiments ; they are those of un- 
 alterable friendship ! and did 1 ever dare 
 to hope, to expect more ? Oh"] my dear 
 friend, the heart is full of involuntary de- 
 ceptions ; it imposes even on itself; and 
 it is less dii^xcult to correct its errors than 
 to discover them ; infinitely easier to mo- 
 dify its passions, than to trace them to 
 their secret sources: under a thousand dis- 
 guises they gather strength and vigour in 
 our bosoms, and we are insensible to their 
 existence, until we have no longer the 
 power, or the wish, to resist the active 
 force of their tyranny. Alas ! could 1 have 
 believed that I should trace the progress 
 of a mere prepossession, from admiration 
 to sympathy, from sympathy to esteem, 
 from esteem to love — fixed, impassioned, 
 unalterable love ? My dear friend, beneath 
 these various sentiments, the undermining 
 principle was still the same, yet it did not 
 wholly conceal itself. The moral sense is 
 still alive to every latent evil that would 
 secretly oppose it. The abyss sometimes 
 presented itself to n)y view, but when I 
 should have fied, I only closed my eyes^ 
 and shut out its dangers. 
 
 My spirits are lov/ and sunk ; I am far 
 
 from being well ; and the unpleasantness 
 
 of my present situation is not among the 
 
 c. 6 * leatt 
 
is6 
 
 least evils I have to sustain. The deli- 
 rium to which I have of late res!<rned 
 myself, blinded me to every impression 
 unconnected with itselt. These people are 
 narrow-minded and ilhberal ; they per- 
 ceive my attention to their children much 
 slackened ; and the means they take to 
 reanimate it are such as must eventually 
 prove abortive. The great stimulus to the 
 exertions of a generous mind is kind- 
 ness : they might reduce me to slavery, 
 but they animate me to rebellion. I 
 could almost believe, that every suffering 
 sinks before the oppression of a weak, 
 an interested, and unfeeling mind, inca- 
 pable of decision. Its mode of afflicting 
 the heart of the object of its caprice or 
 aversion, is varying and unceasing ; per- 
 severing without energy, it wearies the 
 spirits and harasses the feelings ; and, in 
 proportion as the mind it persecutes, ri^es 
 superior to itself, it strains every inven- j 
 tion to humble and depress it. A heart, 
 though not innately good, if supported by 
 a strong understandmg, may be capable 
 of many virtues ; but a heart regulated 
 in its operations by a weak mind and 
 illiberal ideas, is capable of every species 
 of depravity. 
 
 When my feelings had encountered any 
 little trial, when the independence of my 
 .spirit shrunk beneath the attack of op-t 
 
 pression, 
 
157 
 
 prcssion, and my warm heart chilled io 
 the freezing blast of unkindness or neg- 
 lect, my harassed thoughts had still one 
 sweet refuge to fly to, and found it in the 
 idea of Olivia. At night, when I sought 
 my comfortless pillow, when memory 
 threw her shadows on my mind, and re- 
 flection wearied me by her cogitations, I 
 invoked the spirit of repose, and it de- 
 scended on my soul in the form of Olivia ; 
 and when I awoke with the first beam of 
 the morning, I said, " Perhaps in a few 
 hours I shall see her — I shall hear her." 
 My spirits renovated in the delightful con- 
 viction, and my mind was armed against 
 all the contingent evils of the day : but 
 »o\v I must, I ought to learn to forget her. 
 — " Should yoQ ever forget me, St. Clair,'* 
 said she to me the other day, " it will be 
 a heresy against the omnipotent power of. 
 sympathy." 
 
 To suppose it possible, Olivia, would 
 be to dissipate the sweetest hope of my 
 life ; for the fond recollection of those I 
 loved on earth, is the best blessing 1 have 
 annexed to the enjoyments of my heavenly 
 Utopia. To forget you in this world is 
 impossible ; your idea is become the m- 
 thnaU associate of my soul. Death itself 
 cannot dissolve this union ! 
 
 LETTER 
 
158 
 
 LETTER XLV. 
 
 My dear friend, this Colonel, this lover, 
 is returned. Shall i confess my weakness 
 to you ? I have pleadtd indisposition, and 
 have not left my apartmt-nt since his ar- 
 rival. He came yesterday evening a little 
 before dinner. I am a great favourite with 
 the children, and am always the first to 
 hear good ntvvs, whether of a party in the 
 summer house, or a cargo of toys from 
 town : they came skipping and jumping 
 info my room almost frantic — " Such news, 
 Mr. St. Clair — you would never guess; 
 who do you think is come?" (I had two of 
 them on my knee in a moment.) " Let me 
 see ! perhaps James's poney, from grand- 
 papa's ?" — * Oh I a gieat deal belter — bro- 
 ther Frederic, the Colonel ;" and away 
 they flew. Lliagine my feelings I I had 
 just been arranging Olivia's little notes, 
 with some fragments and poems 1 had re- 
 ceived from fjer at different times, in a 
 ^ort feuiUe. 
 
 This morning he rode over to the Ab- 
 bey. Gracious God ! how 1 envy him his 
 feelings ! Even now, at this moment, a 
 thousand rapturous expectations fluttering 
 at his heart i every pulse throbbing with 
 
 transport, 
 
^59 
 
 transport, and every thought a thought 
 of hhss — he is flying to the arms of 
 Olivia. 
 
 What, if she participates in his emo- 
 tions — if her heart throbs ri sponsively to 
 his, and if all the slumbering sensations 
 of first love awaken with his presence ! 
 The thoiight is madness! Only to think of 
 his arriving yesterday, and not seeing her 
 till this morning ! Heavens and earth, were 
 I in his situation ! — I should not be sur- 
 prised to hear he walked his horse, and 
 paid a visit en chem'm fefarit. How strongly 
 do little circumstances of tliis kind mark 
 the character ! " Intervals," says Mon- 
 taigne, " best discover the man." 
 
 LETTER XLVI. 
 
 Did T tell you that the Colonel's bro- 
 ther. Major L . had accompanied him ? 
 
 To-day I was introduced to them both. 
 The former, I thought, received me v^-ith 
 the air of a patron, yet with all the suavity 
 of a man of the world ; and I might al- 
 most say, the cordiality of a relation. I 
 am sorry to tell you, that I can find no 
 
 fault 
 
i6o 
 
 fault with him. His person is manly and 
 handsome,though not interesting, and there 
 is that placid expression in his countenance, 
 which speaks tiic man, equally a stranger to 
 care or disappointment. His manners are 
 pleasing, if not strikingly elegant, and 
 seem perfectly uninfluenced by his feel- 
 ings : they are invariably ihe same. He con- 
 verses well, yet with a precision bordering 
 on study ; and his information, which he 
 displays without the least ostentation, is 
 general, though well selected. He has 
 the character of being a very brave officer, 
 and a man of the nicest honour, but not 
 a professed duellist ; which is the charac- 
 ter his brother is anxious to obtain. He 
 seems penetrating and phlegmatic, with 
 the best understanding, totally devoid of 
 genius ; and, by some literary remarks I 
 have heard him make, endowed with more 
 judgment than taste. The Major is some 
 years younger than his brother, and in 
 every respect inferior to him, except in 
 ptTson : he appears shallow, vain, self- • 
 sufficient, and overbearing: I do not like 
 him, and our accquaintancc will probably 
 r St where it is. The joy which their arrival 
 has spread through the family, recalled to 
 mv mmd the simdar emotions my return 
 would excite in my beloved little family. 
 A natural association of ideas sprung from 
 
 the 
 
i6i 
 
 the reflection, and agllated my heart 
 and mind with many pleasingly painlul 
 emotions. *;)«:** # 
 
 'i^ ^ ^ ^ "^ ^ 4? 
 
 I had written thus far, when the Colo- 
 nel's man came with his master's compli- 
 ments, to request I would ride oat with 
 him, if I was not engaged. We had scarce- 
 ly mounted our horses, when he entered 
 with apparent interest into my future pro- 
 spects, with the air of one who really 
 wished to serve me ; and mentioned that 
 there would he a vacancy in his regiment 
 in a month or two ; which I could till up, 
 till something better occurred. He was yet 
 speaking, v^^hen we arrived at the avenue 
 of the Abbey, I involuntarily stopt. My 
 dear friend, I have had the forbearance 
 not to go near the Abbey since the arrival 
 of these two young men ; and in the course 
 of eight days I have seen Olivia but once, 
 and that in a crowd of company at the 
 Castle, when she came late, and re- 
 tired early. The Colonel w s delicate 
 enough not to pay her any maiked atten- 
 tion ; and when he did address her, she 
 betrayed neither the timid emotions of 
 tenderness, nor the mysterious diffidence 
 of love He however spends the greater 
 part of every day with her, and they ride or 
 drive out constantly together. 
 
 The Colonel, observing that I did not 
 
 proceed 
 
l62 
 
 proceed with him, said, *^ You must ac- 
 company me to the Abbey, where I assure 
 you, you are a favourite; you have made 
 yourself two sincere friends, in the Baro- 
 net and his grand-daughter j and the for- 
 mer is as fully capacitated to judge of the 
 merits of the heart, as is the latter to ap- 
 preciate those talents which spring from 
 inherent genius, and are cultivated by a re- 
 fined education." 
 
 Imagine how I felt while he was speak- 
 ing : I was weak enoush to be so dcli'ihted, 
 that there was no possibility of my refus- 
 ing to accompany him; yet my emotions 
 increased every step we took, and I al- 
 most felt relieved, when the servant told 
 tis that Olivia had gone out to visit a 
 sick family in the neighbourhood, and had 
 not yet returned. The Colonel left me in 
 the breaklast-room, and went to visit Sir 
 Patrick, who is confined, by a fit of the 
 rheumatism, to his apartment. — This 
 breakfast-room ! it was there we always 
 spent the greater part of our mornings — • 
 every article of its furniture recalled to my 
 mind some pleasant remembrance, that 
 m( mory dwelt on with fondness. On a 
 little cedar table that lay in the window, 
 I had a thousand tmies drawn and written 
 by her side ; a music-book of Swiss airs, 
 I had copied for her, lay open on the 
 piano-forte ; and many a happy moment 
 
 I had 
 
163 
 
 I had passed, leaning over the chair that 
 was placed at the harp. Sweetly did this 
 memento awaken the faded recollection of 
 my past joys ; and made me feel that there 
 is " a joy in grief, when peace dwells in 
 the soul of the sad." Mine was at peace 
 with all the world, at variance only with 
 itself! — I touched, with romantic pleasure, 
 the chords of that instrument I had so 
 often listened to with delight ; it returned 
 a melancholy vibration — and at that mo- 
 ment she entered the room. I could not 
 conceal my agitation, nor was she wholly 
 immoved ; her colour changed ; and 
 though she gave me her hand with an 
 air at once cordial and graceful, I thought 
 it trembled in mine — but possibly the 
 tremor of my own made me suppose it. 
 
 " It is not thus," said she with an en- 
 dearing smile, '•' my truant friend, I should 
 receive you !" 
 
 " It is not thus indeed you should re* 
 ceive me ; for you render temptation irre- 
 sistible, and in one moment deprive me 
 of the reward I had earned, by the self- 
 denial of a thousand." 
 
 *' But if you retain any ' faint sketches 
 and shadows of Christianity about you,' 
 you will recollect the Apostle bids you 
 * count it all joy, when you fall into divers 
 teu)ptationsV* said Olivia, with that arch 
 
 air,. 
 
264 
 
 air, which always renders her so danger- 
 ous and so charminjx. 
 
 " And Heaven is my witness," said I, 
 ** that a * joy past joy' is that which now 
 pverwhehins my senses and my heart; but 
 ah ! OUvia, I fear this treacherous joy is^ 
 like the flower which conceals beneath 
 the freshness of its bloom, and the fra- 
 grance of its odour, the most deadly 
 poison." 
 
 She blushed and turned from me, and 
 seating herself at the piano-forte, said, 
 " It is a long time since I have played for 
 you !" — While she spoke, the Colonel 
 entered : Olivia must have seen him be- 
 fore, by the manner she received him ;. 
 and when he had answered my inquiries 
 for Sir Patrick, he requested her to play 
 one of the lessons he had brought from 
 England. She coraphed, and I never 
 heard her play with so much execution, 
 or so little sensibility ; the Colonel all the 
 while was beating time with the accuracy 
 of an amateur, and interrupted her fre- 
 quently in the most exquisite passages to 
 detect a plagiarism. He is certainly not the 
 auditor Olivia takes pleasure in playing 
 to. *' When we go to London,*' said he, 
 " you must have Clementi !" — When zve 
 go ! ah I that we ! It is certain, that at 
 the instrument he considers her as a mere 
 
 rausician.i 
 
i6s 
 
 musician ; while to me she appears like 
 an enchantress, who, by the sorcery of 
 her art, even in the simplest airs can 
 
 -Take the prison'd soul, 
 
 And wrap u in Elysium.'* 
 
 We took our leave toa:ether ; and on 
 our way home, the Colonel talked sufH- 
 ciently of her to convince me that he loves 
 her as well as he can love any human be- 
 ing ;« and that is about halt" as well as she 
 deserves to be loved. 
 
 As long as i respect the purity of her 
 virtue — as long as I do not offend her ears 
 by an open avowal of the passion which 
 consumes me — as long as I consider her 
 as the wife of another — I cannot see what 
 there is to prevent me loving her. You 
 talk to me ot the duties I owe society : 
 what have the secret affections of a solitary 
 heart to do with them ? You speak to me 
 of my own peace of mind ; but the very 
 agonies of love are to me more delightful 
 than the happiest calm of indifference: 
 and did I cease to love her, I should ex- 
 claim, with Petrarch, '* 1 am free — but I 
 am wretched !" It is probable I shall be 
 an officer in her husband's regiment : this 
 must afford me an opportunity of being 
 near her; and surely my heart is as sus- 
 ceptible of the chastity of sentiment and 
 refin-ement of passion, as Metastasio che- 
 rished 
 
i66 
 
 nshed for the Countess D'Althem ; Tasso, 
 for Leonora D'Este ; or Petrarch, for 
 Laura, You would laugh had you be- 
 held with what intense impatience I have 
 lately looked over the works of these en- 
 amoured writers ! Henry IV. to sanction 
 his marriage with the Countess de Guiche, 
 quoted twenty examples of monarchs who 
 had married their subjects, and thirty 
 others whose great alliances had rendered 
 them miserable: so true it is, that when 
 the heart adopts an irregular passion, the 
 sophistry of perverted understanding soon 
 furnishes it with reasons for its nourish- 
 ment. 
 
 LETTER XLVir. 
 
 FROM OLIVIA. 
 
 In the first period of our acquaintance, 
 a little manuscript volume, which I made 
 the repository of those fugitive thoughts, 
 the spontaneous result of adventitious feel- 
 ing or accidental situation, attracted your 
 notice ; you expressed a wish to have a 
 copy of it, and I promised that you should. 
 The circumstance has probably escaped 
 your memory, but the pride it excited was 
 sufEcient to cherish its existence in mine : 
 
 you 
 
167 
 
 you will therefore do me the favour to ac- 
 cept of it, and at once flatter the vanity 
 of an author, and gratify the feehngs of a 
 friend. To watch the ideas rifing in my 
 mind, and to attempt their realization, 
 had so early methodized into habit, that 
 I can scarcely trace back the moment when 
 I first adopted a pursuit, redolent with 
 pleasure, and not wholly destitute of im- 
 provement, if to know one's self is the 
 first lesson recommended to the study of 
 human nature. And yet, let me not arro- 
 gate a faculty which the most virtuous 
 have not laid claim to — the wisest dare 
 not : I never directed my thoughts into a 
 channel Vi'hich might eventually lead to 
 gelf-investigation, and consequently to 
 self-correction ; I rather suffered them to 
 direct me, to lead me with a gentle vio- 
 lence I wished, yet could not resist, 
 through the flowery labyrinth of imagi- 
 nation, or the most daring heights of en- 
 thusiasm ; leaving me visionary where 
 they should have left me prudent ; para- 
 doxical, where they should have left me 
 rational ; and too frequently realizing the 
 system of Malbranche, that " our ideas 
 are distinct from our understanding.'* 
 
 LETTEE 
 
i68 
 
 LETTER XLVIII. 
 
 TO OLIVIA. 
 
 No, Madam; it was not possible I 
 should forget a request proiijpted by the 
 most ardent wishes ; but I scarcely dared 
 to hope that a pronjise, given with a very 
 careless assent, and to a very inconsequent 
 object, would escape violation. You how- 
 ever have taken the most effectual means 
 to punish me, for supposing you for a mo- 
 fnent deficient in the least ot those minu- 
 tiae of excellence, which may be esteemed 
 the minor attributes of virtue. 
 
 I received your little volume with the 
 same devout veneration as the most enthu- 
 siastic disciple of the sect of Omar would 
 the sacred production of his tutelar an- 
 gel * ; and the little repository of Olivia's 
 thoughts is to me ten thousand times 
 more estimable in its simple blue cover, 
 than the Codex Argenteus of Upsala, with 
 its violv t-< oloured leaves and silver cha- 
 racters, ever was to its possessor : it shall 
 be unto me as a talisman to counteract the 
 evils of my fate; for in its pages I shall 
 
 * The Koran, supposed to have been written by 
 the angel Gabriel. 
 
 5 seek 
 
169 
 
 seek for that refinement and elevation of 
 sentiment, which shall enable me to rise 
 superior to the trials of common-place 
 life ; and, still more, when destiny shall 
 have thrown me far, very far from its ami- 
 able author ; when time shall have chilled 
 the ardours of youth, and the gloss of its 
 sensations shall be tarnished by the sickly 
 breath of decrepit experience ; then shall 
 this little volume revive the intercourse of 
 soul that once subsisted betv^een Olivia 
 and her friend. Memory, awakening from 
 her slumber, shall give back to the mind 
 the visions of those soothing images it 
 once dwelt on with delight ; the warm 
 spring of imagination shall again flow to 
 the touch of happy recollection ; and the 
 heart and spirits, withered and shrunk in 
 the chilling apathy of sorrow and disap- 
 pointment, shall expand and dilate in the 
 fond recollection of joys that are no 
 more. 
 
 LETTER XLIX. 
 
 I HAVE received a letter from Olivia ; it 
 was accompanied by a small packet : un- 
 luckily the Colonel and Major were in 
 the room when the servant delivered it : 
 H 1 imme- 
 
170 
 
 I immediately recognised her hand-writing 
 in the superscription, and llie impression 
 of the seal was Olivia's. 1 hurried out of 
 .the room to peruse it ; but not, I fear, 
 before the two brothers had observed my 
 agitation ; it was almost impossible it 
 could eseape them, for surprise and plea- 
 sure rendered it excessive: after all, this 
 letter was only to request my acceptance 
 of a litile manuscript book of poetical and 
 prosaic fragments she had half promised 
 me some time back. Alas ! my dear 
 friend, this little mark of attention, al- 
 inost unexpected, overthrew all my resola- 
 iions (for I had made some, such as you 
 would have approved of; ; it revived those 
 spirits which gave life and energy to my 
 hopes, and love and happiness triumphed 
 over the ruins of reason and prudence. I 
 am now reinstated in all my precious 
 little immunities at the Abbey; but as I 
 am conscious that 1 can only hold my 
 in.sl uial'lv.' charter by a prudence the most 
 corP' n.mate, I behave with a caution so 
 proTound, that I could not awaken the 
 susoifions of tlic Colonel, though he were 
 nu-ie jealous than a superannuated Turkish 
 basnavv : in s'lort, I am become a perlect 
 Machiavel m Ionc. I contrive to pay my 
 visits at t'u AMicy when ! know he is 
 elsevvhire tngagid, and frequently refuse 
 an invitation to dinner, or an evening 
 I party 
 
I7E 
 
 party there before him ; yet there is, at 
 times, a cool penetrating glance lurking 
 in the keen eye of this phlegmatic man, 
 that overthrows ray best-concerted strata- 
 gems, and makes me feel, that, however 
 possible it may be to counterleit love, it 
 is impossible to conceal it. 
 
 This morning I was reading Guarini 
 for OH via, as she painted by my side: the 
 Colonel entered unexpectedly ; he drevv a 
 chair, and sat opposite to us, begging IjC 
 might not interrupt me ; for he knew 
 enough of the Italian to receive very great 
 pleasure from Guarini, in spite of the con- 
 tempt the author himself testified for his 
 own productions. I wished to excuse 
 myself, but was obliged to go on. I had 
 just begun the impassioned soliloquy of 
 Amarilla; and, with an emotion I could 
 not repress, read the fcliowing lines : 
 
 " Perche crudo destino 
 
 Ne disunice tu, s'amor ne stringe? 
 
 E, tu perche ne stringe, 
 
 Si ne parte il tlestin perftdo amor * ?" 
 
 I involuntarily read the passage twice ; 
 Ohvia heaved a sigh, " rather imagined 
 
 * Why, oh cruel destiny ! hast thou divided us 
 whom love has united ? and thou, oh treacherous 
 )ove! why hast thou united those whom destiny has 
 ioi ever separated ? 
 
 H 2 than 
 
172 
 
 'Ihan perceived," and ihe blush that suffus- 
 ed her face, was livelier than the tint of 
 the rose she was copyinfr. With eager 
 delight I gazed upon that blush, flowing 
 from a heart which perhaps at th.at ma- 
 inent throbbed responsiveiy to mine A 
 look from the Colonel avvakent-d nic from 
 my delinum ; his heart-searching glance 
 was aUernately directed at us botli ; yet 
 .with a composure, a presence of mind, it 
 is impossible he could assume, he said, 
 " That is indeed a charming idea, and it 
 is with reluctance we pay our tribute of 
 -admiration to a man whose life was a flat 
 contradiction to his sentiments. Gunrini, 
 the most admired of poets, was the worst 
 of tat hers, of friends, and of citizens; 
 and, strange to say, this little work (every 
 line of which breathes passion) has bet ti 
 ranked, by the celehrptcd jiuhert de Mire, 
 among the most pious works of the age ; 
 conceiving it, from its title, to have been 
 a treatise on the duties of pastors." Is it 
 possible that a man whose heart was agi- 
 tated by the least pang of jealousy could 
 thus declaim upon tiie merits of a piece, 
 or the demerits of an author, with the 
 sentrntious accurary of a professional cri- 
 tic ? No ; I cannot think that at that mo- 
 /nent he harboured a suspicion ! neither 
 fCan I accout t lor the marked expression 
 2 of 
 
173 
 
 of bis penetrating glance ; it was perhaps 
 only, the phantom of a very sensitive con- 
 science. And how am I to account lor 
 thy warm blush, and the soft sigh that 
 accompanied it, my charming Olivia I — 
 Ah ! 1 would rather trace them to their 
 final cause, and follow them through all 
 their connexions and effects, than deve- 
 ]ope the most complicated phenomenon 
 in the physical or moral world, that ever 
 puzzled the brain of profound philofopby. 
 Perhaps, however, it is as well as it is. 
 
 •' Where ignorance is bliss, 't is folly to be wise." 
 
 Certainty might destroy a thousand 
 visionary hopes with which I am now feed- 
 ing my heart; but a liitle poem which 
 Olivia, who drank tea at the Castle this 
 evening, put into my hand, did not tend 
 to, diminish them — you must have it; if 
 you knew the pleasure I take in transcrib- 
 ing her sentiments, you would scarcely 
 thank me on y-our own account for the 
 trouble. 
 
 FRAGMENT TO SYMPATHY. 
 
 The eye of sympathy alone can trace 
 The kindred feelings beaming in the face ; 
 Whose ever nicely true expression tells 
 The itrong emoaons which the bosom sweils ; 
 
 H 3 That 
 
174 
 
 That warms the rapid current in the rem. 
 Or ciiilU the sensate heart uith mortal pain | 
 That gi\es the fluttering pulse its sudden beaf. 
 And re-inmnes the heart's extingiiish'd heat j 
 Ti etc finei lines tliat ;hun the careless eye, 
 Those fleeting tints tliat scarcely live to die ; 
 Those fragile fibres whicli connecting find 
 The quick successive shadowy tribes of mind ; 
 The transient biu^h to rapturous ieelings true. 
 The pallid cast or Glisappointment's hiiej 
 The gl;ince which emanates the anxious mind, 
 Ir» res'less search, its kindred self to find; 
 The flow and ebb of bliss, still sure to roil 
 Its glowing tide, warm from the sensient soul; 
 The tender glance that melts within the eye, 
 Th' unconscious smile, the scarcely breathed sigh. 
 The silent tear, the thought but half express'd, 
 The sudden heave that lifts the feeling breaw ; 
 No look, no wold, tscapes the anxious eye 
 Of secret, sacred, heaven-born gympathy^ 
 
 LETTER L. 
 
 Thie Colonel almost livcs at the Abbey, 
 and 1 sotnetinics accon'pr. nv liira, or I 
 should liave no cliancc of seeing Olivia ; 
 for it is now almost impossible to meet her 
 alone : her manncT to nic is less playful, 
 less insinuating!:, but not less cordial ; 'and 
 by a thousand liiilc endearing cltorts she 
 strives to cement a iricndship betv\ een two 
 n!en, who, bit for her. liad probably 
 needed no such cilbrt. 1 cannot make 
 
 free 
 
^7S 
 
 free wlih the Colonel ; I esteem bim, huf 
 I cannot like him, and yet I am sure he is 
 a worthy man. How often while I look 
 at or listen to htm docs the Epio-fam of 
 Murlial to Sahldis occur to my mind ! and 
 when my reason most applauds him mj 
 heait exclaims, 
 
 '* Noi amo te, nee possiiin dicere quare; 
 Hoc tantum possum dicere, no.i arao te." 
 
 In our litcrarv or sentimental arguments, 
 though Olivia sometimes coincides with 
 me, she alvajs acknowledges the supe- 
 riority of his judgment, and submits to 
 his opinion with such unaffected meek- 
 ness, lliat in spite of the evident dissimi- 
 larity of their minds, almost persuades me 
 she loves him ; and yet can a mere gene- 
 ral coinridence of opinion, independent 
 of a per'LCt congeniality of sentiment, he 
 a permanent giound of attachment? it 
 may of friendship, but I doubt whether it 
 can of love. 
 
 Bayle, Voltaire, Bolingbroke, and 
 Hume, are always with C'-.lonel L ■ - 
 the most dangerous of v.riters, and con- 
 sequently the worst of citizens. You, 
 who know my opinion of these authors, 
 will easily imagine our arguments run 
 high. Olivia generally preserves an arm- 
 ed neutrality on these occasicwis; and, 
 when her timidity trembles for the vehe- 
 H 4 mence 
 
176 
 
 mence of my manner, she a1vva3's termi- 
 nates our dispute by some little bewitch- 
 ing artifice, some httle assertion, in whicii 
 there is more of heart and teeHng, than 
 cool reflection; and delivered with an air 
 and a smile, that make me forget the 
 subject wc discussed — every thing but 
 herself. The Colonel listens to her with 
 an attention as cool as if a doctor of the 
 Sorbonne was delivering a Latin thesis ; 
 censures or approves with the air of a 
 professional critic, and weighs the justice 
 or detects tlie fallacy of her position, with 
 the sober seriousness of a judge. My dear 
 friend, this man, witli all his profound 
 good sense, has a common mind ; and his 
 c!iaracter may not be inaptly compared to 
 the musical scale of the Chinese ; it has 
 neither sharps nor fiats : some lull and 
 simple sounds may be produced from its 
 vibration ; but you would in vain look tor 
 those tender half-tones, that divine and 
 delicate harmony, whicli sooth the senses, 
 and speak to the very soul ! or, in the 
 tcchnic phrase of a sister art, he has no 
 pencil toncljcs, it is all broad masses of 
 ii^ht and s/uJe. 
 
 LETTER 
 
J77 
 
 LETTER LI. 
 
 Every day discovers the dissimilarity 
 of their minds, and how Httle they were 
 formed for each other: it is in vain to 
 conceal it from you ; I observe it, my dear 
 friend, with malicious satisfaction. Yes- 
 lerday I rambled over to the Abbey ; I had 
 put a volume of the *' Nouvelh Eloise'' in 
 my pocket : this was my excuse ; I had 
 promised it to her some time back, and 
 kept it as a corps da resewe. 1 thought 
 the Colonel had gone to the neighbouring 
 town, as he had mentioned such an inten- 
 tion at breakfast ; I found him reading to 
 Olivia at her v^'orkino; table; I was con- 
 fused, and immediately presented her the 
 book, as if to do so had been the sole 
 cause of my visit ; the Colonel took the 
 book out of her band. 
 
 " And you are going to peruse Eloisa ?" 
 said he gravely. " 1 am going to rtpe- 
 ruse it," replied Olivia : " it is, I think, 
 one of those books we read with avidity, 
 lay by with regret, and look forward with 
 delightful anticipation to that moiPjcnt 
 when we shall again read, and again ad- 
 mire." 
 
 " There are errors," said the Colonel, 
 
 with increased gravity, •' which admit of 
 
 H 5 no 
 
17S 
 
 no excuse, and should meet with no tole- 
 ration. To be warned of a danger, and 
 yet to seek it, is among the number : 
 * the woman who reads this book is lost,' 
 says its author, and yet you find it in the 
 hands of every woman who reads at all." 
 
 " Let us consider this assertion," said 
 Ohvia, *' as among the many paradoxes 
 which clouded the genius of Rousseau ; 
 and, I believe, oftener proceeded from 
 nervous irritability, and the pettishness of 
 disappointed expectations, than from in- 
 tervals of intellectual weakness or men- 
 tal depravity. For to be ^nscious of 
 composing a work calculated to destroy 
 the virtue and happiness of one half of 
 the species, and to write it in a style most 
 likely to seduce that half to its perusal, is 
 an act too contradictory to the general 
 tenour of Rousseau's life and sentiments to 
 obtain credence even from the most un- 
 thinking mind. For my own part, if I 
 am to judge of the general tendency of a 
 work by the impression it makes on my- 
 self, I know of no work that rises higher 
 in the scale of morality tlian the one in 
 question. It is not by repeating the word 
 virtue that Rousseau cnfones its senti- 
 ments; he steals it into our hearts, and 
 leads us to embrace its principles vv'hile we 
 fancy we are only admiring the style in 
 which they are clothed." 
 
 *' His 
 
179 
 
 «^ His style," said the Colonel, '•' is 
 even more dangerous than his principles . 
 it is that which betrays you to embrace 
 opinions whose evil tendency is concealed 
 beneath the graceful drapery of flowery 
 language; and I really believe that more 
 fair unfortunates have been made by his 
 sentimental sorcery, than by the undis- 
 guised libertinism of a Sedley or a Wil- 
 mot. Where is the woman who would 
 not prefer being the elegant, the impas- 
 sioned, the highly gifted, but criminal 
 Eloisa, to the formal, uninteresting, but 
 virtuous Clarissa ? Vice is never so irresis- 
 tible in its example, as when wit, talents, 
 and sentiment, lend their charms to its 
 decoration." 
 
 " Good Heavens!" exclaimed I, "and 
 can you name vice and Eloisa in a 
 breath r" 
 
 " It is difficult," said he, '' to define 
 the precise limits of vice and virtue ; but 
 Eloisa was certainly guilty in an instance, 
 which, considered relatively with regard to 
 its effects on society, may be termed a' 
 crime. If virtue were so arbitrary in its 
 nature as to be estimated only by circum- 
 stance and situation, even the most guilty 
 might produce some extenuation of their 
 crime; but the conduct of an individual 
 is to be judged by those laws^ which so- 
 H 6 ciety 
 
ciety has framed for the preservation of its; 
 well-being and general happiness ; and 
 according to their fiat, Eloisa was not in- 
 nocent." Only to listen to this lover, 
 this bridegroom, arguing on the impru- 
 dence of an ardent passion, with the cool 
 sagacity of an ancient Bramiu, or stoic 
 philosopher! I could not help repeating 
 from Alamanni with a smile, which Olivia 
 slilv returned, 
 
 ** Chi vuol dar legge a lamorosa node, 
 Non sa beo qual siala sua natura." 
 
 " That sentiment, Mr. St. Clair," said 
 ihe Colonel, coldly, " sounds better in 
 Italian poetry, than in morality." 
 
 This m^an has always plain common 
 sense on his side ; he argues, lie never 
 feels, and there is sometimes no replying 
 \o him. I was silent ; but Olivia saw what 
 passed within my mind, and a look from 
 her restored me to myself. 
 
 '^ And yet," said 1, " a moral may be 
 drawn, even from the imputed crime of 
 Eloisa ; for if the magnanimity, the piety, 
 the more than masculine mind of this su- 
 perior v/oman, were not proof against a 
 temptation too heedlessly embraced, and 
 an unwarrantable confidence in, her 
 own powers of resistance ; docs it not to 
 
 weaker 
 
i8i 
 
 weaker minds*, and stronger passions, in- 
 culcate the necessity of flight Irom the very 
 first approach of a pleasing error, which 
 may eventually terminate in vice. The 
 first step, however remote from the cen- 
 tral point of criminality, though not always 
 decisive, is to be feared ; and he who de- 
 monstrates that the first deviation Irom 
 right, in even the worthiest characters, 
 may terminate in consequences fatal to 
 themselves, and injurious to society, does 
 as much service to the cause of morality, 
 as he who draws a faultless standard for 
 the imitation of mankind, and colours 
 the finished picture with lights and tints 
 beyond the most lively glow of human 
 perfection." 
 
 Olivia had thrown by her work, and 
 listened to me with the most profound at- 
 tention ; while the Colonel, fixing his 
 keen eye on my face, made me feel that 
 *' conscience does make cowards of us all ;'* 
 for I was glad to digress a Httle from the 
 subject, and added, 
 
 " Much, I believe, of the illiberal cri- 
 ticism which was aimed at Rousseau, was 
 levelled rather at the author than his 
 
 * In St. Clair, as in many other young people in 
 their first involvement in error, the sense of right 
 had survived this adherence to its precepts j and the 
 conduct of the man was an evident contradiction to 
 Jhe theory of the dialectician. 
 
 work. 
 
l82 
 
 work. He who rises up to demoHsb con- 
 firmed prejudices and undermine received 
 opinions, will excite against him the igno- 
 rant and tlie prejudiced; and that, I be- 
 lieve, eonstitut(S the a2gref!;ate of man- 
 kind; yet it is certain that when he speaks 
 of virtue, it is with a copiousness, an energy, 
 that '^an proceed only from the heart. He 
 considers riirht and wrons; not in their 
 individual effect, but in tiicir abstract and 
 invariable state ; and, master of these pas- 
 sions, he traces them through all their mo- 
 ditied tbrn-is and combinations; but when 
 he speaks of love, it is with a retine- 
 ment, a sensil^iiity, tliai marks the inter- 
 val bctv een the trigid sentiuients and com- 
 mon-place attentions of mere gallantry 
 and simple prefeience, and the sublimity 
 of that ennobling passion, which he, with 
 so much delicacy, yet with so much ani- 
 mation, unfolds. Goethe alone is wor- 
 thy of rivalling Rousseau on this subject ; 
 and I compassionate the man who is not 
 transported with the beauty of their style, 
 •when they touch o'er the affections, the 
 passions, the feelings of the hutnan heart.'* 
 Olivia had resumed her work, and I 
 observed her colour increase as 1 spoke ; 
 while the Colonel said, " You would 
 Lave done well to have confined your pa- 
 negyric to their style ; its magic is unde- 
 niable; but its influence is transient when 
 
 reason 
 
reason and reflection are siiifcred io exert 
 their powers : ///tvz Goethe tails to palHate 
 suicide; and Rousseau t(j extenuate se- 
 duction; t/jen Wertcr appears to us the 
 uniiappy victim of ungovernable passions, 
 whose example is the more dangerous from 
 the prepossessing; a niability of his charac- 
 ter ; and St. Preux, as the betrayer of 
 innocence, and the violator of every law 
 of iiospitality. For my own part, I will 
 candidly own, if I had a young friend, 
 whose studies I was anxious to direet, the 
 authors in question would be the last I 
 should recoa)mend to her perusal." 
 
 " There is certainly a description of 
 mind," said Olivia, with warmth, " which 
 might warrant such a prohibition ; a mind 
 whose principles are not fixed, whovSe cha- 
 racter is not formed, and whose passions 
 are ardent and flexible: but if you mea- 
 sure the merit of a work by the effect it 
 may produce on the ignorant, the silly, 
 and the weak, I am afraid there are not 
 many which will escape the fiat of your 
 prohibition ; I doubt if even your favour- 
 ites, Pamela, Clarissa, or Sir Charles 
 Grandison, v/ill be able to secure a saving 
 clause in their favour : for my own part, 
 there are no authors I read with more 
 pleasure than Goethe and Rousseau ; they 
 gpcak to ray heart, tliey enlarge my 
 ideas, they liberalize my mind, and they 
 
 strengthen 
 
i84 
 
 strengthen those bonds of philanthropy 
 which bind me to my fellow-creatures." 
 
 " But you are unique^'' said the Colo- 
 nel, with a smile. I do not think he 
 meant this as a sarcasm : there is an un- 
 conscious air of superiority about Olivia, 
 that bids defiance to violation ; yet, when 
 a moment after I turned round to take 
 my leave, a tear gleamed in the eye that 
 avoided mine. Yon cannot conceive my 
 feelings at that moment : the Colonel was 
 deliberately setting his watch by a little 
 French time-piece that hung over the 
 chimney. A pause of a minute ensued ; 
 at last Olivia raised her melting eyes to 
 mine, and their glance spoke. Happily 
 the old gentleman entered at that instant, 
 and his cheerful cordiality terminated a 
 silence and a situation equally distressing. 
 He pressed us both to stay dinner ; the 
 Colonel pleaded an engagement, and I, 
 who had no such excuse to make, could 
 not resist the entreaties of the Baronet, and 
 the solicitation of my wishes. In the even- 
 ing, when the Baronet was engaged with 
 the parson at backgammon, and I was 
 Jeaning over the back of Olivia's chair at 
 the piano-forte, she turned the conversa- 
 tion to that of the morning : " I believe,'* 
 said she, " I did not take the Coloael's 
 compliment in the sense he meant it." 
 
 « If 
 
i8j 
 
 '* If you took it in an unkind one," said 
 1, " I am sure you did not." 
 
 " And yet/' said she, musing, " I 
 thought his countenance wore an air of 
 sarcasm : but it must have been mere ima- 
 gination. He is so worthy a soul, that I 
 beheve him incapable of wounding the 
 feelings of any human being; and so phleg- 
 matic a one, that I do not think it possible 
 to irritate him to a poignant reply ; he 
 may have the wit, but he has not the ener- 
 gy to make one." 
 
 " A. panegyric and a sarcasm in a 
 breath," said I, smiling. 
 
 " Oh I I do not m an it as such. I 
 know him to be the be>t of men; and it 
 is certain that tliere was a great deal of 
 truth in what he advanced : for, though 
 I sometuucs oppose his opinions as repug- 
 nant to my own, yet J look up to ti)«nn 
 with deference, as proceeding Irom a good 
 heart and from a sound judg ncut, totally 
 free from the influence of the passions : 
 but he should have been horn a hundred 
 vcars hack. — and you, St. Claii , vuu should 
 have been born a bund red yrais hence ; 
 then you would be understood, now you 
 are only gue>sed at. You have got in 
 advance witii vour species, and your senti- 
 ments arc not those of the p'cseiii day, 
 but of times yet to come. There is just 
 this duTcicnce between you and Colonel 
 
L : you feel, he argues ; j-ou love 
 
 to trace an effect to its remotest cause, to 
 seek the source of truth under the most 
 complicated appearances ; to read human 
 nature, not through the medium of others, 
 but by the light of your own mind, and 
 to embrace every dereliction from esta- 
 blished custon) or doting prejudice, 
 which reason points out and virtue sanc- 
 tions. He loves to support received opi- 
 nions, which time has sanctioned ai>d ex- 
 perience approved, to inveigh against all 
 innovation, and to conceive the antiquity 
 of a system is the best proof of its infalli- 
 bility. You, more feelingly alive " to each 
 fine impulse," have more sensibility, more 
 imagination, and your joys, more exqui- 
 site, more poignant, are far beyond even 
 his power of conception. He is, J believe, 
 the wiser man, perhaps the happier, and 
 certainly the most prudent ; but I would 
 rather be you." 
 
 Oh, the seduction of this unstudied 
 flattery ! Where now was my prudence, 
 my resolution ? Olivia read in my counte- 
 nance all that was passing in my mind ; 
 and turning round to the instrument, she 
 played that sweet and melancholy air 
 wiih which she first charmed my soul, and 
 which she well knows always sooths the 
 perturbation of my mind and spirits. She 
 soon participated in the effects slic meant 
 
 to 
 
187 
 
 to produce on me, and, suffering tlie strain 
 to die away, wc butli remained silent. — 
 There is a magie in this description of 
 silence it is impossible to define, and I 
 never truly felt its force but in her society. 
 It has most frequently occurred when 
 we have been listening to a peculiar style 
 of music, conversing on some objf-Ct that 
 came home to our hearts; or when we 
 have laid down a book in silent debght at 
 some passage it contained. In proportion 
 as the soul is sensibly touched, the mind 
 loses tlie power to comment, and silence 
 becomes eloquence itself. There is also a 
 certain point of feeling and emotion which 
 even a breath destroys : it is one of those 
 nice and fine movements of the soul which 
 the true Epicurean in sentiment alone 
 knows how to foster and enjoy. The fa- 
 culty of speech can only follow the heart 
 and imagination to a certain degree ; and 
 the feelings, when raised to their acme of 
 e-ntliusiasm and power, scorn the aid the 
 proudest eloqbence can give as inadequate 
 to their expression. " it is extraordinary,'* 
 said Olivia the other day, in answer to 
 some observation I had made, " that many 
 of the sentiments which fail from your 
 lips, seem as if you had stolen them from 
 mine ; and I am at a loss to recollect wlien 
 I made such and such remarks as I hear 
 you accurately repeat ; so perfect is the 
 
 coinci- 
 
1 8,8 
 
 coincidence of onr reflections, so stron^^ 
 
 is the sympathy tliat " She stopped 
 
 abruptly, and i'lushcd. With such an open- 
 ing, common-place gallantry would have 
 been eloquent ; I would not have spoken 
 for the world : we both remained silent. 
 Situated as we are, how dangerous aio 
 these silences ! 
 
 LETTER LII. 
 
 From my first introduction to Major 
 L , I observed certain inimicalities in 
 our dispC'Sitions which bid defiance to an 
 intimate connexion, and therefore I did 
 not seek it, while he evidently avoided it. 
 He even sometimes affects to treat me 
 with pointed acrimony, which I return 
 vv'ith interest ; and in general conversa- 
 tion opposes me in every argument with 
 that decided air of conscious infallibility, 
 which is ever the concomitant of igno- 
 rance, and consequently with a warmth 
 and vehemence which always gives me 
 advantage. A circumstance has occurred, 
 however, which must render him ray 
 enemy, or secure him my friend, according 
 to the influence which virtue holds over 
 his mind, or vice over his passions. By a 
 
 circum- 
 
189 
 
 circumstance the most accidental, I was 
 the fortunate instrument of rescuing; a 
 young female from the life of iniamy and 
 misery the Major was preparing for her; 
 and I was equally successful in liberating 
 a young man, who was on the point of 
 being married to her, whom the M jor 
 had caused to be fraudulently enlisted, in 
 erderto farilitaie the attainment of ihe ob- 
 ject of his illicit passion. They were both 
 in the humblest walk: of life: the girl is 
 handsome and modest ; the lad, honest 
 and industrious; and I had the pleasure 
 of seeing them united yesterday by the 
 rector of the parish. Olivia has taken 
 4hem under her protection, without know- 
 ing more of their story, than that ihey have 
 been attached tor many years, and have 
 supported the most unblemished charac- 
 ters of any young people in the neigh- 
 bourhood : this she lias done on my re- 
 commendation. In short, my dear friend, 
 I am convinced that when we enter stre- 
 nuously, and v«'ith all our hearts and Souls, 
 into the cause of virtue and justice, how- 
 ever limited our powers or moderate our 
 abilities, we s'lall scarcely fail of crowning 
 our endeavours with success. My con- 
 duct, however, which at first seemed to 
 startle the credibility of the Major, would 
 certainly have been productive of very se- 
 rious consequences, had not this unprin- 
 cipled 
 
190 
 
 clpled young man dreaded the affair get- 
 ting air (as it was attended by some cir- 
 cuirstances of the hlaekest furpiludej, and 
 injuring bini willi liis father, with whom 
 he is now nsing every nieaiis to liquidate 
 debts which he has incurred to a very large 
 amount. He accused me with very great 
 vehemence for the part I had taken in a 
 business wiiich did not in tlie least concern 
 me. 1 defended myself with the energy 
 of a man who is supported by the consci- 
 ousness of having acted right ; and after 
 an altercation carried on with great impe- 
 tuosity on both sides, he parted from me, 
 uttering; in a tone of acrimony, " Since 
 you have taken on you the character of a 
 censor, beware of your own conduct, Mr. 
 St. Clair ; you may be fallible in the very 
 point on which you have condemned me." 
 Ah, my dear friend ! that was touching on 
 a chord that vibrated to my very soul ! I 
 am indeed fallible, most fallible : and were 
 both our conducts analyzed by the micro- 
 scopic eye of the scrutinous moralist, per- 
 haps my haughty relative would not carry 
 the pre-eminence in vice. The objects of 
 both our passions was the promised bride 
 of another * ; and if the personal virtue 
 
 of 
 
 * " Conscience dictates that we ought not to treat 
 aien disrespectfully, that we ought not causelessly to 
 slimate their affections from other: ; and that in general 
 
 we 
 
191 
 
 of one would have fallen a sacrifice to il- 
 licit passion, what a risk might not the in- 
 tellectual purity, the menial peace of the 
 other incur ! Happily, both have escaped 
 unsullied ; nor can I accuse myscll of hav- 
 ing taken any obvious and direct means to 
 secure a return to that passion, which, ar- 
 dent and all-pervading, is no longer con- 
 fined to the seat of sensibility, but is min- 
 gled with every emotion of my soul, and 
 blended with every atom of my frame. I 
 was in hopes, that when cool reflection 
 succeeded to the first fervour of resent- 
 ment and disappointment in the breast of 
 the Major, he would see my conduct in 
 its true light ; but I am sorry to tell you, 
 it has produced a very contrary eitect from 
 what 1 either expected or intended. I fear 
 this mistaken young man thinks from me 
 in the fancied inferiority of vice ; but his 
 deviation has bound me to him by the only 
 tie of sympathy that could unite us — mu- 
 tual frailty ! 
 
 Gracious Heaven ! is it for man, weak 
 man, trembling in the consciousness of his 
 own imbecility, to bear down upon the 
 tottering steps of his weaker brother? and 
 should not every generous sluice of pity 
 
 we ought to forbear whatever may tend to break their 
 peace of mind, or tend to unqualify them for being 
 good men and good citizens." 
 
 KojMeV SL'te/ifS of Morality^ vol, h. p-age 281. 
 
 and 
 
192. 
 
 and toleration be opened In bis bosom, for 
 the fallibility of that creature whose nature 
 be wears, in whose frailties he partici- 
 pates, and to whose errors he is liable ? 
 Aioms that we are in the boundless space 
 of the creation, surrounded by mystery, 
 involved in uncertainty ; knowing not 
 from whence we came, or whither we 
 shall go; beings of an instant; with all 
 our powers, all our energies hastening to 
 decay ! — is it for us, my dear friend, to 
 assume the right of umpire, and refuse 
 that mercy to each other, which we all 
 look for in common to Him who is him- 
 self perfection ? 
 
 For my own part, in proportion as the 
 weakness of my nature unfolds to the 
 power of temptation, I become slow to 
 condemn the actions of others ; and 
 though I lament their effects, I dare not 
 condemn them, while ignorant of the pas- 
 sions which instigated the circumstances 
 which impelled and the opportunity which 
 seduced. It was the opinion of a philo- 
 sopher, that " he who hates vice hates 
 mankind;" and, indeed, the web of life 
 is such a " mingled yarn of good and ill 
 together," such a compound of social and 
 dissocial passions, of generosity and self- 
 ishness, virtue and vice, that even the 
 best may sometimes stand in need of the 
 toleration of the most indifferent of man- 
 kind, 
 
»93 
 
 kind, and even the worst may sometimes 
 extort the esteem of the most perfect. I 
 really think the probity of Fabricius, the 
 justice of Aristides, or the patriotism of 
 Regulus, never excited warmer emotions 
 of admiration in my breast, than the libe- 
 rality, the philanthropy of Atticus, who, 
 unswayed by party, unbiassed by interest, 
 could at the same time honour the opposite 
 virtues and talents of Pompey and Caesar, 
 TuUy and Cato, Augustus and Brutus ; 
 honouring their virtues as a philosopher, 
 and feeling for their vices as a man. I 
 can only say in answer to your last letter, 
 that you argue like one 
 
 " Who never felt th' impatient throbs 
 And longings of a heart, that pants 
 And reaches after distant good." 
 
 It would now be more dangerous to fiy 
 than to remain. Absence is always favour- 
 able to true love, and fatal only to those 
 spurious emotions which assume its name. 
 An enforced removal from the object of 
 our passion touches the sentiment with 
 something heavenly, especially in the cli- 
 macteric of its existence. The presence 
 of her we love, bewitches us with ail that 
 can please in woman ; but absent from her, 
 her idea raises us to the sensibility of an- 
 gels. It is Rousseau, I think, who men- 
 tions a lover that left his mistress for the 
 I purpose 
 
194 
 
 purpose of thinking of her ; and Fontaine 
 tells us, who always spoke from a perfect 
 knowledge of the human heart, 
 
 <• La defense est une charme on dit qu'elle assais- 
 
 sonne, 
 Les plaisirs, et surtout ccux que I'amour nous donne." 
 
 No, my dear friend, I cannot for the 
 present accept your friendly invitation ; 
 but 1 am not the less flattered by the kind- 
 ness which prompted it. 
 
 LETTER LIII. 
 
 My fate is hastening to a climax. Olivia 
 is to be married in less than three weeks : 
 all this is what I expected, but I expected 
 it as the world docs death ; I knew it was 
 inevitable, yet lived as if it was never to 
 arrive ! You can form no judgment of the 
 misery that preys on me ; your equable 
 temperament and phlegmatic mind are 
 exempt from that excess of feeling, which 
 can elevate to the remotest extreme of 
 bliss, or sink to the last abyss of wretched- 
 ness. You tell me, that my passion, by 
 its very nature, must be transient, for it is 
 violent and hopeless ; but you appreciate 
 it by common maxims, and judge of me 
 
 by 
 
193' 
 by common men. You talk of love as a 
 youthful appetite, not a serious and over- 
 whelming passion; and you tell me I may 
 nourish the propensity, while I resign the 
 idea of her who inspired it. Oh ! you 
 fortunate and susceptible beings ! in whose 
 breasts the first emotion of nature is love; 
 who, accustomed to its power, can retain 
 the passion, while you successively change 
 its object ; it is, indeed, to you a series 
 of light and pleasing emotions ; nor does 
 the apprehension of its future termina- 
 tion embitter the enjoyment of its existing 
 delights : but a heart like mine, destined 
 to love but once, and to concentrate the 
 whole force of its tenderness in the passion 
 with which it throbs, for one only object — 
 it is, indeed, a powerful and overwhelming 
 sentiment, and its misery is derived from 
 its unalterable durability. My dear friend, 
 does not our power to resist a prevailing 
 passion arise from the frequency of its 
 trials, and the experienced effects of its 
 dangerous consequences ? but where that 
 passion, which no circumstance has as yet 
 called forth, strengthens in our bosoms, 
 how fiercely does it blaze forth in the 
 moment of its awakened existence ! 
 
 Robed in the sacred stole of divinity, 
 without power, without temptation, be- 
 hold the youthful Heliogabalus dispensing 
 the benefits of the deity ; he served in the 
 I 2 temple 
 
196 
 
 temple of Emisa, the emanations of di- 
 vinity beaming in the beauty of his coun- 
 tenance ; but removed from the altar to 
 the empire of the world, the slumbering 
 passions wake into life, and prove their 
 wretched victim a monster of folly, cruelty, 
 and sensuality. 
 
 You tell me, passion should be com- 
 bated by passion. Alas ! what passion can 
 I oppose to that which consumes me ? You 
 answer. Glory. Where is it now to be 
 found ? in the page of the Greek or Ro- 
 man historian, or the chivalric deeds of 
 a Preux chevalier ? But the truth is, my 
 present views of conquest extend no fur- 
 ther than " the rich plunder of a taken 
 heart." A taken heart ! and yet I once 
 thought — but it is over — the shadow of a 
 vapour was not more transient, or more 
 unsubstantial ; the sunbeam that precedes 
 the horrors of the storm was not more 
 bright or more delusive. Oh Olivia ! 
 Olivia ! you have not used me well ; you 
 have smiled me into misery, and have pre- 
 sented to my eager lip that cup of seeming 
 bliss, whose poisonous but delicious beve- 
 rage is at this m^ ment circulating its ve- 
 nom through every artery in my heart. 
 
 LETTER 
 
'97 
 
 LETTER LIV. 
 
 I HAVE entirely given over my visits 
 at the Abbey, and had not seen Olivia 
 till to-day, when every person of any dis- 
 tinction in the neighbourhood dined at the 
 Castle. I watched for the Baronet's car- 
 riage for an hour before it appeared ; the 
 Colonel, I believe, was similarly occupied; 
 for he flew to meet it, and almost lifted 
 her out, as if the earth was unworthy of 
 the pressure of her foot. My foolish 
 heart throbbed with such delight when I 
 beheld her, as if I had not seen her for an 
 age ; yet it is not more than a week — and 
 is not that an age in the calendar of love ? 
 She looked up at the window where I was 
 standing, and bowed, while the Colonel 
 was waiting at the carriage door ; she 
 seemed to forget that he was — and I for 
 a moment forgot him too. When I en- 
 tered the drawing-room he was seated by 
 her, and she appeared, I thought, engrossed 
 by his attentions, which were more airy, 
 more winning, more fascinating, than I 
 had ever beheld the n, and such as no 
 woman coulB receive with indifference : 
 he indeed seldom condescends to trifle, 
 yet he can do it with spirit, and even 
 I 3 grace; 
 
198 
 
 grace ; and every woman in the room 
 seemed to be of the same opinion, for 
 every eye was iixed on him. I never saw 
 him look so well ; he was dressed in full 
 uniform ; his countenance was animated, 
 and health and pleasure glowed on his 
 cheek. I stood at a little distance from 
 them, and a large mirror reflected the 
 whole group. What a contrast did the 
 spi&ndour of his dress, the gaiety of" his 
 airj the health and happiness of his ap- 
 pea^^rance, present to the deep mourning 
 of my habilimenis, the wan and pallid 
 cast of my complexion, and the gloomy 
 look of hopeless despair that shaded my 
 countenance ! Every one was conversing 
 wilh a friend or an acquaintance — T stood 
 alone! The Colonel was fastening Olivia's 
 bracelet : he took an opportunity, when 
 unobserved, to kiss her hand before he 
 relinquished it. Olivia blushed and smiled, 
 as she used sometimes to smile on me; 
 then her eyes met mine, and I think her 
 colour faded : she observed my wretched 
 appearance, and felt for me. 1 could sup- 
 port it no longer ; my temples throbbed 
 with violence, a dead weight pressed on 
 my heart, and I retired unperceived by 
 any but Olivia : her eyes followed me to 
 the door. My absence has not been no- 
 ticed, for dinner is over, and no inquiries 
 have been made for me. While I am 
 
 writing 
 
199 
 
 writing to you from the open window of 
 my solitary apartment, the busy hum of 
 pleasure and conviviality faintly reaches my 
 ears from below ; the air that breathes on 
 my face is fragrant and renovating, and 
 the agitation of my spirits subsides to the 
 solemn influence of the hour. It appears 
 to me, that the evenings here, like the 
 parting summers of Auburn, " their lin- 
 geiing bloom delay;" the first star that 
 glitters in the west is robbed of its beamy 
 prerogative, and the sun still blushes here, 
 when a little more southward he has re- 
 signed his influence to the empire of night. 
 Thus the soft and stilly hour I love so 
 dearly is here protracted ; and while it is 
 astronomically accounted for by the greater 
 obliquity of the sun's path to the ecliptic, 
 I am willing to believe that Time^ who is 
 constantly committing some theft on my 
 happiness, suffers a lingering hour to as- 
 sume that shadowy twilight drapery, which 
 gives an artificial peace to my soul, for the 
 real bliss of which he has deprived it. 
 
 To watch the gradationary changes of 
 the seasons, which even a single day pre- 
 sents us with, always sheds a solemn plea- 
 sure over my thoughts, purifies and re- 
 fines them. The shadows of night are 
 gathering in; I throw down my pen to 
 watch the fading light of the setting sun ; 
 now he sends forth a single beam from 
 I 4 behind 
 
200 
 
 behind a mass of clouds, where, enthroned 
 in darkness, seems to hover the spirit of 
 the storm. The mountains rejoice in the 
 momentary beam, and swell on the sight 
 above the mists that ascend in graceful 
 columns from their rugged sides ; bright, 
 yet shadowy, is their appearance, and 
 scarcely can the strained eye define their 
 «ummit from the orient clouds which float 
 around them. Dear mountains ! how often 
 have I watched the rising of the moon 
 which was to have marked your awful 
 height ! how often have I seen its mild 
 light sink beneath your shade, and the 
 xnists of the morning, rising in light va- 
 pours from your summit, shed their dew 
 upon the valley! The sun dissipated those 
 vapours, and his beams exhaled that dew; 
 but many suns have returned and disap- 
 peared, yet the cloud still hangs on my 
 soul, and the dew of sorrow still trembles 
 in my eye. These mountains shelter a 
 luxuriant valley, which embosoms the 
 dwelling of Olivia : I can still discern it, 
 though the shadow of the mountains has 
 almost obscured the view ; but ils fair in- 
 habitant is not there, and am I under the 
 same roof with her, and yet wretched ! I 
 once thought that impossible. 
 
 Oh, love ! if I deplore those mature 
 delights, which lam destined never, never 
 to experience, still more do I regret those 
 
 refined^ 
 
20I 
 
 refined, those pure and innocent pleasures, 
 which ushered in your first influence over 
 my heart, when rapture dwelt upon the 
 wing of fancy, and every thought, every 
 glance, every word, added a new and 
 dehcious throb to the general sensation of 
 bliss that thrilled through my frame. Me- 
 teors of a moment, ye have but made my 
 *' darkness visible." 
 
 I have been this hour listening in the 
 corridor to the voice of Olivia; every song 
 was followed by a burst of applause : the 
 silent and rapt emotion with which I lis- 
 tened to her was worth it alJ. 
 
 LETTER LV. 
 
 I HAD determined not to go near the 
 Abbey, and even refused the Colonel yes- 
 terday to ride over there with him. To- 
 day I was wandering about the mountains, 
 and by a sudden break through a coppice 
 that clothed their declivity, found myself 
 in the rich meadows belonging to the 
 Abbey, where a sturdy peasantry were 
 gathering in the harvest, and presented to 
 the eye a scene at once animating and 
 picturesque. I was pleasantly lost in its- 
 contemplation, and lolling over a little 
 J 5. wicket 
 
202 
 
 wicket that opened to the Abbey grounds, 
 when Olivia, her grandfather, and Colonel 
 
 L , advanced from among a group 
 
 of the reapers to the spot where I stood. 
 I never felt more confused or more agi- 
 tated. Olivia, I thought, returned my 
 bow with as much coldness as I made it; 
 and the old gentleman, having chid me 
 with his usual cordiahty for my long ab- 
 sence, took the Colonel by the arm, and 
 walked to the other end of the meadows 
 to speak to his steward : I was almost on 
 the point of running after them, when the 
 voice of Olivia arrested me. 
 
 " We were not always indebted to 
 chcijice for the pleasure of seeing you," 
 said she, in a tone I thought reproachful, 
 though kind. " Nor are you now," said 
 I ; " I think it was rather instinct that 
 led me to the spot where you were, and 
 which proves, in this respect, as it has 
 fatally done to me in many others, that, 
 with regard to its constant operations, it 
 has too frequently the advantage even over 
 reason itself." 
 
 " Pope thought so too,'' said Olivia, 
 smiling, " for he tells us, 
 
 * And reason raise o'er instinct as you can, 
 In this 't is God directs, in that 't is man.' 
 
 But Vk'hat a dangerous induction might 
 be drawn from this argument 1 ' Follow 
 
 * instinct. 
 
203 
 
 ^ instinct, it is the law of God ; follow 
 ' reason, it is but that of man'." — " And 
 why should we not suffer ourselves," said 
 I, with a warmth I could not suppress, " to 
 be actuated by that principle which the 
 Deity himself has infused into our souls ? 
 which irresistibly leads us to the pursuit 
 of what is best adapted to our nature; 
 which secretly influences us to seek what 
 is most congenial to our feelings ; which 
 draws the heart to its kindred heart, and 
 forces every sense to acknowledge the 
 supremacy of its power ! , Naturalists tell 
 us, that the body is only at rest in the 
 place that is fit for it ; but the soul in vain 
 seeks to repose in the haven o( ils desires: 
 virtue, which is arbitrary ; reason, which 
 is sophistical ; and custom, which is 
 dotage, rise up in clamorous opposition 
 to subdue its efforts ; and, wearied by con- 
 tinual conflicts, it submits to the over- 
 whelming torrent of narrow prejudices and 
 vulgar errors." 
 
 *' It was not thus you used to argue," 
 said Olivia, looking mildly up in my face, 
 and, I fear, shocked by the vehemence of 
 my manner : " you did not always consi- 
 der man as a being wholly selfish, living 
 solely for his own gratification, and war- 
 ranted by the laws of nature in opposing 
 his own individual enjoyment to the ge- 
 neral happiness of society at large ; to the 
 I 6 promotion 
 
204 
 
 promotion of which, partial self-denial and 
 reasonable restraint arc indispensably ne- 
 cessary : but in this, as in many other re- 
 spects, you are much changed since I first 
 knew you." — " I am, I am indeed much 
 changed, Olivia, since we first knew each 
 other — dreadfully changed." 
 
 " You disappoint, "continued she," your 
 friends by your absence ; you mortify them 
 by your neglect, and you alarm them by 
 your conduct : come, come, my dear 
 friend, your spirits are depressed, you are 
 agitated; look at this smiling scene; while 
 the eye contemplates it, can the heart 
 mourn ?" 
 
 My spirits were indeed depressed, for 
 with the weakness of a child 1 wept ; and 
 while the sweet smile of Olivia " seemed 
 not to know what guests were in her 
 eyes," she pointed out to me the most 
 beautiful features of a landscape truly ani- 
 mating, and with that witchcraft of man- 
 ner which she ever exerts over me v/ith 
 such invariable success, drew me from 
 misery, and from myself. 
 
 " Tliis scene,'* said I, " strongly re- 
 sembles a landscape in La Valais ; such as 
 I last beheld it, when, surrounded by my 
 beloved family, 1 participated in one of 
 those delicious and simple little festivals, 
 with which we ever ushered in the vin- 
 tage." A thousand tender recollections 
 4 throbbed 
 
205 
 
 throbbed at my heart as I spoke, and fancy 
 gave to the memory of past pleasures (ah ! 
 guiltless pleasures) a glow which actual 
 truition scarcely bestowed. I expatiated 
 on those scenes, those regions of myste- 
 rious sublimity, " where Nature, with all 
 her grand works about her," assumes a 
 thousand varying aspects of opposite 
 beauty and effect. Imagination conjured 
 lip every scene in fond succession, marked 
 by the artless pleasures of life's early- 
 dawn ; and memory dwelt on the soothing 
 "vision with the liveliest delight. My 
 charming auditress entered into the full 
 enthusiasm of my feelings, and laying her 
 hand on my arm as it rested on the gate 
 over which we were leaning, she said, 
 *' Ah ! my dear friend, if the spot on 
 which chance had thrown you in the 
 morning of your life, can excite this af- 
 fectionate emotion in the bare recapitula- 
 tion of its scenes, what tender, what 
 lively sentiments must such a heart as 
 yours treasure for those who are the elected 
 objects of its glowing and poignant af- 
 fections !" Gracious Heaven ! what a re- 
 flection from her lips ! I involuntarily 
 pressed mine to the beloved hand that 
 rested on my arm ; my eyes filled with 
 tears; I trembled from extreme agitation; I 
 was silent, but I was understood. At that 
 moment the Colonel and Sir Patrick re- 
 turned. 
 
206 
 
 turned, and I took my leave. My spirits 
 are now more composed, and I give myself 
 up with a kind of calm and gloomy re- 
 signation to the influence of that despair 
 which no hope enlivens, no reason can 
 subdue. 
 
 LETTER LVr. 
 
 You too conspire with the rest to dis- 
 tract me. Gracious Heaven ! what a letter 
 was your last ! " My dear friend," ah ! 
 is it thus you write ? " you deceive your- 
 self; your conduct admits of no extenua- 
 tion ; every look, every word, since you 
 have first known this dangerous woman, 
 have been pointed to destroy that peace in 
 her bosom, which was no longer the in- 
 mate of your own. The heart which love 
 has truly touched by a thousand secret 
 and imperceptible operations, is ever on 
 the anxious v/atch to excite a similar sen- 
 timent in the heart of the object of its 
 idolatry ; and nature and impulse are con- 
 stantly surmounting those barriers which 
 reason erects between passion and virtue." 
 And again ; " This unhappy passion has 
 not only blinded you to your own interest, 
 but obliterated the best impressions that 
 Nature ever marked upon the heart of 
 
 man. 
 
207 
 
 man. You have broken those endearing 
 ties which once bound you to life ; you 
 have resigned, for the dehrium of an im- 
 moral sentiment, that soft and equable de- 
 light which flows from the natural affec- 
 tions of the heart. I have had a letter 
 from your mother, full of tender anxieties 
 and maternal fears ; you have written but 
 twice to her since your arrival in Ireland ; 
 she fears she no longer has a son ; I fear 
 so too !" 
 
 Well, you have shewn me the full ex- 
 tent of my error ; but of what avail is all 
 this recrimination, but to make me feel 
 that the arrow of despair is never so mor- 
 tal, as when reflection bathes its point in 
 the venom of conscious guilt ; but why, 
 my dear friend, do you add in the next 
 line, ** Even the attainment of all your 
 ardent desires must be the greater cause of 
 all your misery ; you must be conscious 
 that you are beloved, and if your heart is 
 not dead to all remorse, that consciousness 
 must render you wretched." 
 
 Beloved ! by whom ? by Olivia ? Gra- 
 cious God ! When I read this sentence 
 (which I have done at least a thousand 
 times), all else that you have written 
 vanishes from my mind like the transient 
 gloom of a passing cloud. Yes, you are 
 right ; I am beloved. If to understand the 
 feelings of my soul expressed by some 
 
 tone 
 
208 
 
 tone most fine, most indescribable ; if to 
 be tremblinfrly alive to the same impres- 
 sions, and influenred by the same emo- 
 tions, be love, then I am beloved. Oh, 
 Nature ! we are thy children, thy artless, 
 thy unsophisticated children ; shelter us in 
 tiiy maternal arms from the fate which 
 awaits us ; or if on the world's wide sur- 
 face thou canst find for either a more 
 adapted companion, whose soul is warmed 
 with stronger sympathy to ils kindred soul, 
 whose heart has a single fibre more true 
 to its fellow heart, a pulse more in unison 
 to iis ardent palpitation, I bow to the fiat 
 of my destiny, I submit without repining; 
 but I shall submit in the arms of death. 
 *********** 
 
 It is two days since I began this letter, 
 and the perturbation of my spirits has 
 been such, that 1 have not been able to 
 sit down for a moment to finish it. I 
 have just received a letter from my mo- 
 ther, full of tender expostulations, but not 
 one reproach. Lydia, too, has written to- 
 me that this dear parent is in a very de- 
 clining state, and has pined in bitter and 
 unceasing anguish since I left her : I have 
 therefore determined to return to them. 
 An obligation to these people / will not' 
 owe I they seem to look, upon me as a 
 maniac, and atfect to treat me as a de- 
 pendant. 1 have therefore written to my 
 
 mother 
 
209 
 
 mother to expect me: I have a little 
 scheme in my head, which, if it succeeds, 
 will enable me to add to her income, and 
 to live with her. This is all I can look 
 to on this side of the grave, but beyond it 
 my hopes lighten. 
 
 ♦' O Death ! acceptable is thy sentence 
 to him whose strength fails him ; to him 
 that despaireth and hath lost all patience." 
 The very name of death now sounds to 
 my ears like that of a friend, and I think 
 I could resign myself to his arms with 
 that sweet and grateful sensation felt by 
 the weary and exhausted traveller, when 
 he sinks in the soft embraces of a tranquil 
 repose. Whether we look upon death 
 with the suspicious eye of scepticism, or 
 the bright and fancy-tinged glance of en- 
 thusiastic faith and smiling hope, we must 
 still consider it as a friend, that in all the 
 frailties of earthly enjoyments or earthly 
 sufferings, still hovers near to snatch us 
 to its friendly bosom, when the pressure of 
 life is no longer supportable, and when 
 existence becomes too heavy a burden for 
 the wretch on whom it has been forced. 
 
 LETTER 
 
210 
 
 LETTER LVIT. 
 
 On Thursday next Olivia is to be mar- 
 ried, and this is Monday ; the wedding is 
 to be private, yet there is an air of bust- 
 ling consequence about every one I meet, 
 an importance in every countenance. 
 
 7'his morning at breakfast the Colonel 
 
 was shevvinsc Ladv L a set of diamonds 
 
 he had just got from London. I shall say 
 nothing of my feelings; but let no man 
 trust merely to the goodness of his heart, 
 who has suffered passion to get the ascend- 
 ency in his mind. I would not intention- 
 ally destroy the wasp who should sting 
 me, and yet He who opposed the love of 
 virtue in my soul to the strong and impe- 
 tuous passions of my nature, has viewed 
 in the fatherly omniscience of his care, that 
 in competition with its possession how little 
 I have held the world and all its ostenta- 
 tious nothings. Yet, my dear friend, there 
 are moments, horrid moments, when acts 
 of villany suggest themselves to my pol- 
 luted imagination, and to profane every 
 law of virtue, to violate every rite of mo- 
 rality, wants only the power of perform- 
 ance. Exhausted and weary from the 
 violent exertion of passion and despair, I 
 
 awaken 
 
2It 
 
 awaken as from a dream that placed me 
 on the brink of some dreadful precipice. 
 I shudder ! I prostrate myself before the 
 Divinity I have offended ; tears, burning 
 tears, dry on my flushed cheeks, and vir- 
 tue seizes on my heart. Divine emanation 
 of the Eternal Essence, who breatlies life 
 thro'.igh the universe! I feel thy power; 
 and sweeter are the tears with which thou 
 sufFuscst the eye, and more soothing are 
 thy expostulations in all their amiable se- 
 verity, than the delusive smile of Vice, or 
 the seduction of her caresses in all the al- 
 lurement of their witchcraft. As long, my 
 friend, as long as I have the power of re- 
 proaching myself, I shall yet hope I am 
 not dead to virtue; I dread nothing but 
 that deadly slumber of the conscience, 
 when lulled by the soothing song of the 
 syren passions into a fatal security. 
 
 An Hour after Midnight. 
 I threw down my pen to enjoy a soli- 
 tary ramble in one of the finest nights I 
 ever beheld, and I have returned cheered 
 and refreshed. The solemn stillness of 
 the hour has shed a sweet and soothing 
 melancholy over my heart, and my ha- 
 rassed spirits seemed to repose in the soft 
 sublimity of its influence. I have been 
 gazing upon those celestial phenomena, 
 in the splendour of whose structure the 
 
 acmi 
 
212 
 
 ccme of human grandeur shrinks into an- 
 nihilation ; my thoughts subHmated in 
 their contemplation, and my soul, as if 
 soaring from the narrow boundaries of its 
 mortal coil, and freeing itself from the 
 incumbrance of matter, has ranged through 
 a boundless " wilderness of suns," and in 
 each scarcely perceptible luminary has 
 traced the centre of a magnificent system, 
 irradiating by its beams the retinue of 
 worlds, which, in all the harmony of or- 
 der, revolve round its attractive influ- 
 ence : then casting my eyes on the vast 
 expanse, I feel my own inconsequence in 
 the creation ; I shrink bark upon myself; 
 the worm under my feet ceases to be an 
 object of contempt ; I dare not deny the 
 affinity of our connexion: like an atom 
 on the face of the earth, my knowledge 
 only extending to an imperfect acquaint- 
 ance with the spot on which I crawl, my 
 perio'i of existence a moment, my sphere 
 of ait ion a speck, I stand opposed lo the 
 Creator of a myriad o! universes, my soul 
 is h'imble.i lo the du-t, and i prostrate 
 m)self before that Divinity, against whom, 
 a moment before, I raised my voice in 
 impious complaint, and bade him " shew 
 the heavens more just/' 
 
 Six 
 
213 
 
 Six in the Morning. 
 What a contradictory compound of lolly 
 and wisdom, virtue and vice, reason and 
 passion, is the mind of man ! A very few 
 short hours have elapsed, since life, with 
 all its joys and all its sorrows, with every 
 earthly, every selfish sentimen', tiad receded 
 from my mind, and left my soul free to 
 expand to the bosom of its Creator. But 
 the awful shadows of night have vanished, 
 and with them the sublime effusions they 
 excited. There is a window in the left 
 wing of the Abbey, which, from its aspect, 
 reflects at this season the first sunbeam 
 that gilds the horizon ; it is the window 
 of Olivia's apartment : she mentioned the 
 circumstance to me not long back, and 
 bid me look in that direction when the 
 sun rose ; since that moment it has been 
 my circle of lumination. I have watched 
 the gradual progress of the dawn, and 
 the retiring of the beautiful planet of the 
 morning, vvith impatience ; and now the 
 window of Olivia's room is reflecting a 
 thousand brilliant rays : it is the Cynosure 
 of love. Worlds, luminary suns, sublime 
 reflections, heavenly resignations, where 
 are you now ? Oh man ! man ! 
 
 CON- 
 
214 
 
 CONCLUSION, 
 
 From the time the unfortunate St. Clair 
 had learnt the appointed day of Olivia's 
 marriage he resigned himself wholly to 
 the influence of passion and despair. Still 
 delicate and guarded with respect to her, 
 he was careless of every surmise his own 
 conduct might excite; and helieving the 
 object of his affection unknown, he was 
 at no pains to conceal the wildness of its 
 effects : it had, indeed, obtained a mastery 
 over his mind, which he had no longer 
 the power to resist; and while he ac- 
 knowledged its tyranny, he made no ef- 
 fort, and scarcely felt a wish, towards its 
 suppression. Intoxicated by the exquisite 
 and lively emotions to which his heart had 
 been newly awakened, and which it vvas 
 eminently formed to feel, he held a fancied 
 existence in the being of another, and by 
 an insensible progression from sentiment 
 to sentiment, he fondly nourished an un- 
 dermining evil, which, under the guise of 
 admiration for what appeared to him most 
 vi'oithy of being admired, had insinuated 
 itself into his bosom, and destroyed its 
 peace for ever ! 
 
 He 
 
215 
 
 He was not unconscious of the futility 
 of his wishes ; but there was a magic in 
 their delusions which he feared to dispel, 
 and which soothed the passion it increased. 
 He was not insensible to the madness of 
 his hopes ; but it was the insanity of love, 
 and to his glowing and susceptible heart 
 more grateful than all the sober sense of 
 reason and prudence. His fine understand- 
 ing could easily have rectified the errors 
 ot his passions; but he had perverted its 
 use, and its sophistry only served to sanc- 
 tion those evils its native strength was 
 adequate to destroy. 
 
 A few days previous to the marriage of 
 Olivia, he was met wandering about the 
 grounds of Desmond, by its worthy and 
 unsuspecting master. By an unaffected 
 coincidence with his most favourite pur- 
 suits, by his prepossessing manners, his 
 talents, and being the son of an old friend, 
 St. Clair had won on his affections, and 
 excited a lively interest in his bosom ; he 
 had remarked his unusual absence, and 
 he now chid him for it with a cordial seve- 
 rity, and insisted on taking him home to 
 dinner. The imprudent and unfortunate 
 St. Clair had not the self-denial to resist 
 the invitation, and accompanied him to 
 the Abbey. He found, or fancied he found, 
 Olivia much changed in her manner to 
 him : this threw him off his guard ; and 
 3 when 
 
2l6 
 
 when in the evening the old gentleman 
 was called away on some magisterial bu- 
 siness, and they were left alone, his power- 
 ful emotions bid defiance to concealment ; 
 and Olivia, scarcely less confused, less agi- 
 tated, attempted to terminate a silence 
 and a situation distressing beyond longer 
 endurance, by saying, with a smile, " that 
 it was a long time since he had read to 
 her," and offered him a book that lay by 
 her on the table ; St. Clair took it in 
 eilence, it was the Life of Petrarch ; and 
 from the first page he opened, he read, in 
 a voice scarcely articulate, the following 
 passage : 
 
 " Till this moment I was a stranger to 
 love, but its brightest fiame was now- 
 lighted up in my soul; honour, virtue, 
 and the graces, a thousand attractions, a 
 thousand amiable conversations, these, 
 oh love ! were thy tender ties, these are 
 the nets in which thou hast caught me. 
 How was it possible for mc to avoid the 
 labyrinth, a labyrinth from which I shall 
 never escape ! Hitherto I feared not love ; 
 my affections, cold as ice, formed around 
 my heart a crystal rampart ; tears were 
 strangers to my eyes, my sleep was undis- 
 turbed, and I saw with astonishment in 
 others, what I had never experienced in 
 myself. Such have I been ; alas ! what am 
 I now ?'* St. Clair flung the book from 
 
 him. 
 
217 
 
 him; he fell at the feet of Olivia; he 
 caught her hands, and pressed them to 
 his heart and to his lips, exclaiming, 
 with impassioned wildness, " What am I 
 now, indeed ?" 
 
 " St. Clair, my dearest friend," sighed 
 the trembling and agitated Olivia, *' re- 
 collect yourself ; 'tis Olivia, 'tis your Olivia 
 who entreats you, supplicates you." The 
 plaintive sound of her voice, the tender 
 melancholy of her looks, melted him. 
 *' My Olivia !" he faintly repeated, " gra- 
 cious Heaven ! my Olivia !" His tears fell 
 upon the hand she no longer struggled 
 to withdraw ; nor did he weep alone : the 
 bosom of Olivia throbbed high, eyery 
 pulse fluttered with exquisite emotion, and 
 the kindred drops that swelled in her eyes, 
 confirmed all those eyes had been but too 
 faithful in expressing. St. Clair was be- 
 loved, and the sorrows of his life were all 
 repaid, all forgotten in the ei stacy of a 
 moment. " It is enough ! it is enouirh !" 
 he falteringly exclaimed ; " now can I 
 die the death of the blessed.'* At that mo- 
 ment a footstep approached the door ; he 
 arose in extreme perturbation, and rushed 
 out of the room to conceal that emotion 
 he could not suppress ; happily it was 
 only a servant ; and before the return of 
 her grandfather, the agitated Olivia had 
 leisure to recover some degree of compo- 
 K sure. 
 
2l8 
 
 sure. Sir Patrick immediately inquired 
 into the sudden disappearance of St. Clair. 
 Love taught Olivia the first lesson of dis- 
 simulation ; her excuse was delivered in a 
 voice of hesitation, and uttered with a 
 blush of virtue's first deviation: indispo- 
 sition, she said, had carried him home. 
 " He is indeed, I think, changed in his 
 appearance," said the Baronet: " I fear he 
 inherits the irritable constitution of his 
 father. Lord L — — is not using him well ; 
 his talents are serviceable to his children, 
 and he would continue him so, by keep- 
 ing him in a state of dependance ; you 
 should use your influence with the Colonel 
 for him, Olivia." She felt for the first 
 time the pang of dissimulation; and while 
 she derived her security from the unsus- 
 pecting simplicity of her grandfather's 
 heart, the consciousness of imposing on 
 it, agonized every virtuous feeling of her 
 own. St. Clair did not return to the Castle 
 till early the next morning ; he had watch- 
 ed from an eminence the light that, till a 
 late hour, appeared in the windows of 
 Olivia's apartment; when it was extin- 
 guished, he ventured to approach near the 
 house, deriving a romantic satislaction 
 from this approximation lo the treasure of 
 his huart, as the soul is fancifully suppos- 
 ed tiO hover near the receptacle of the 
 body it once animated. As he advanced, 
 
 he 
 
219 
 
 he heard fhe saSh of the window drawn 
 lip, and the next moment the sound of 
 her harp struck on his ear ; she played ati 
 old plaintive air, and gave it all the tender 
 expression of which it. was susceptible. 
 
 The most melancholy emotions, min- 
 gled with a thrill of rapturous enthusiasm, 
 seized on the heart of St. Clair; and the 
 soft sighs that stole from the lips of Olivia, 
 and mingled v/ith the sorcery of her music, 
 threw him from every restraint of caution, 
 and prudence : he pronounced her name 
 in a tone of delirium and passion ; the 
 sound of his voice penetrated to the heart 
 of Olivia : amazement and apprehension 
 hurried her from the window ; love insen- 
 sibly drew her back to it, in the voice of 
 St. Clair. 
 
 " Imprudent man !" she cried, *' leave 
 this spot ; would you destroy me ?" 
 
 " Not for a thousand worlds, Olivia." 
 
 " Then fly, for Heaven's sake, leave 
 me for ever !'* 
 
 " One day more, and I shall indeed 
 leave you for ever, Olivia. 1 return im- 
 mediately to Switzerland, never to behold 
 you or Ireland again ; let me then see you 
 for five minutes to-morrow evening in the 
 iishing-house : it is my last request." 
 
 " Impossible!" interrupted Olivia, with 
 increased agitation : " I cannot — I must 
 not consent." 
 
 K 2 *^ You 
 
22 O 
 
 *' You must, you will consent," said 
 St. Clair, wildly : " you have robbed me 
 of my peace for ever ; you dare not refuse 
 me this last, this small request. Oh Olivia, 
 in mercy " 
 
 " Cruel, cruel !" cried the terrified 
 Olivia, weeping with bitterness, " you 
 are urging me on to my destiuction. At 
 the tishing- house to-morrow evening — be 
 it so then." 
 
 Slie hastily closed the window, and St. 
 Clair still remained under it overwhelmed 
 by the most tumultuous emotions, when 
 the sound of horses' feet caught his car, 
 and he observed the heads of two men 
 over the quickset hedge which ran on one 
 s.ide of the lawn, and divided it from a 
 path in the demesne to the next market- 
 town. The horsemen galloped away, and 
 he followed them for some paces, but the 
 darkness of the night soon concealed them 
 irom his view. 
 
 This circumstance at first excited some 
 uneasy apprehensions ; but they were soon 
 drowned in the more poignant emotions 
 that overwhelmed him. The next morn- 
 ing his appearance at (he breakfast-table 
 
 of Lady L was hagard and wild ; 
 
 but scarcely excited notice, and elicited 
 no kind of attention. 
 
 Rich in every endowment which conci- 
 liates affection, attracts admiration, and 
 
 secures 
 
211 
 
 Secures esteem, St. Clair had made him- 
 si^lf some enemies, and no friends, cveni 
 in the very bosom of a family who wete 
 his nearest relatives. The family of 
 
 L grounded its opinions of human 
 
 nature on the ordinary characters of the 
 world, and derived their sentiments from 
 the trite maxims of common-place preju- 
 dice. In their e3'es, situation gave dignity 
 to the man, not the man to the situation ; 
 and they were astonished to find, in one 
 who had been thrown on their bounty for 
 future support, and from whom they had 
 looked for imjjiieit and bumble acquies- 
 cence, the unsiiakea stability of a proud 
 and noble mind, tempered only by that 
 meekness which is the corrective of self- 
 love, not its debasement. His talents gave 
 him a decided superioritv, and the inflex- 
 ibility of his priiicinles did not sufier him 
 to lessen their inliuence by a sycophantic 
 accedence to an inferiority he did not feel 
 and could not assume; the independence 
 of his spirit was looked on as arrogance, 
 and the disinterested tenour of his senti- 
 ments was scoffed at as romance. This 
 striking contrast of character and opinion 
 hid defiance to the iniimacy of friendship. 
 It has been observed, that " many ene- 
 mies is no less a proof of merit than many 
 friends," and St. Clair eviiiced the truth 
 of this assertion ; his superior merit had 
 K 7 raised 
 
.222 
 
 raised him one inveterate enemy In Major 
 
 L , who, arrogant and overbearing, 
 
 impatient of rivalship even in those re- 
 spects in which he had the least claim to 
 perfection, and no wish to excel, envied 
 Jiis cousin for that superiority he could 
 not but feel, and hated him he envied. 
 Their arguments were frequent, their 
 opinions always opposite; and while St. 
 Clair treated his arrogance as the folly of 
 a boy, he opposed his sentiments as the 
 errors of a man. These germs of antipa- 
 thy were soon ripened to maturity in the 
 bosom of the Major, by the discovery 
 made by St. Clair of his dishonourable 
 conduct with respect to the young pea- 
 sant and his bride, and the restraint which 
 that discovery laid him under. From the 
 moment that fear mingled with dislike he 
 marked out its object as the victim of his 
 malice and resentment ; and the unfortu- 
 nately placed passion and unguarded con- 
 duct of St. Clair but too soon furnished 
 him with means of realizing his wishes. 
 The frequent visits of St. Clair to Des- 
 mond A!)bey, the evident pleasure with 
 which those visits were received by Olivia, 
 and his emotions when her name was 
 mentioned, convinced him not only that 
 St. Clair was attached to the betrothed 
 wife of his brother, but that he must have 
 received encouragement sufficient to sanc- 
 
 tioiA 
 
223 
 
 tlon the presumption of such an attach- 
 ment. One passion increased and strength- 
 ened another ; and an opinion, which was 
 at first embraced at the instigation of re- 
 venge, seeking for an instrument by which 
 to exercise its evil intentions, was soon 
 confirmed by a mistaken sense of honour; 
 and as he considered St. Clair as injuring 
 that of his family in the nicest point, he 
 only waited for confirmation of his suspi- 
 cions sufficiently strong to authorize him 
 in the conduct he meant to pursue : in th-e 
 mean time, with an artifice seemingly ini- 
 mical to the impetuosity of his character, 
 he insensibly insinuated suspicion and dis- 
 trust into the bosom of his brother. 
 
 The air of abstraction which involved 
 the manners and conduct of St. Clair, 
 his frequent visits at the Abbey, the strong 
 similarity of his character with that of 
 Olivia, and their mutually favourite pur- 
 suits, were all artfully commented on with 
 plausible exaggeration, and gradually ri- 
 pened some infant surmises in the bosom 
 of the Colonel, which his penetration had 
 awakened, but which his unbounded con- 
 fidence in the aflfections of Olivia, and his 
 faith in the purity of her principles, had 
 nearly stifled in the first moment of their 
 existence. The character of Colonel 
 L was cool, deliberative, and pene- 
 trating ; cautious of admitting suspicion, 
 K 4 he 
 
224 
 
 he was still more cautious of dismissing it 
 when once received; capable of the deep- 
 est dissimulation when warranted by cir- 
 cumstances, and never offering nor ever 
 forgiving any intended insult or preme- 
 ditated injury. He admired the talents of 
 St, Clair; and though the only one of his 
 family capable of appreciating his worth, 
 he would not trust himself with formins; 
 a judgment of his character from the fa- 
 vourable prepossession of external graces 
 and shining abilities. With whatever suc- 
 cess therefore the Major had attempted to 
 awaken the jealousy of his brother, a cir- 
 cumstance occurred, almost on the eve of 
 his marriage, sufficient to excite suspicion 
 had it not existed, and to have confirmed 
 it if it had. The two brothers had gone 
 on a shooting party, at no great distance 
 from the Caslie, and having been induced 
 to join a few convivial friends at the house 
 of an intimate acquaintance, they sent 
 liome their servants ; and returning them- 
 selves at a late hour, as the shortest way, 
 took a bye-path through the Abbey de- 
 mesne. The night was calm and serene, 
 and a strain of distant music stole sweetly 
 on the stillness of the air; they paused, 
 listened with attention, and on a nearer 
 approach to the house, the Colonel recog- 
 nised the tones of Olivia's harp. They 
 walked their horses softlv over the turf 
 
 till 
 
225 
 
 till tbcy came nearly opposite her win- 
 dow. Wliat was the exultation of the 
 Major, the amazement, the consternation 
 of liis brother, when he heard the dia- 
 ]o<Tue that passed between Olivia and St. 
 Clair ! The Colonel was still himself, and 
 thev both rode off without beinjx obst^rved 
 by Olivia, or recognised by St. Clair. 
 
 The next evening, almost an hour be- 
 fore the appointed time, the unhappy St. 
 Clair arrived at the iishin«;-house. The 
 night was cold and gloomy, and a chill 
 blast crept in mournful murmurs among 
 the trees of the extensive wood whose 
 foliage strewed the earth, and was carried 
 by the wind in rustling eddies to the 
 edge of the lake. The mind of St. Clair, 
 whose tone was well adapted to the gloom 
 of the surrounding scenery, was ag(jnized 
 by impatience for the arrival of Olivia; and, 
 tortured vvith apprehensions for her safety, 
 he almost rej)cnted the promise he had 
 extorted, yet almost feared the failure of 
 its accomplishment. At last the Abbey 
 bell struck seven ; a moon-beam that shone 
 dimly through a mass of clouds fell on 
 some object moving at a distance. — It was 
 Olivia 1 He would have flown to meet her, 
 but a chilness seized his heart, his limbs 
 trembled, and he had not the power to 
 move. Olivia observed him, and suddenly 
 stopped. *' Olivia I" he exclaimed. His 
 K 5 voice 
 
226. 
 
 Toice reassured her ; she advanced, and 
 he with difficulty supported her to the 
 fishing-house : her whole frame trembled 
 with excessive emotion ; her hand was 
 colder than that of death, her voice was 
 broken and inarticulate, she breathed with 
 difficulty ; the moonlight that fell on her 
 face, added to its ashy paleness, and her 
 tattering limbs could no longer afford her 
 support. St. Clair in an agony of despair 
 pressed her almost lifeless form to his bo- 
 som, and bending one knee to the earth 
 received the precious burden on the other. 
 The head of Olivia rested on his shoulder ; 
 the tender sigh that stole from her lip, 
 breathed on his ; and their tears mingling 
 as they flowed, relieved the oppression oT 
 their hearts ; those hearts whose rapid pal- 
 pitation diffused a glow through their 
 frames; those hearts which for the first 
 lime throbbed responsively against each 
 other, and felt the full power of their ex- 
 quisite feelings warmed into life. Their 
 emotions were powerful and dangerous; 
 but scarcely a moment was allotted to their, 
 indulgence. The door of the fishing- 
 house suddenly burst open, and two men 
 rushed in. Olivia uttered a faint scream, 
 and clung v^ith horror to that bosom on 
 which a moment before she had reposed 
 in all the debility of weakness, in all the 
 tenderness of passion. 
 
 '« Turn, 
 
227 
 
 " Turn, villain !" said a loud and angry 
 voice, " turn and defend yourself, if your 
 cowardice is not equal to your villany.** 
 — " Suffer me to be the champion of my 
 
 own honour, Major L !" exclaimed 
 
 his brother, in a firm and unimpassioned 
 tone; and gently disengaging the arms of 
 Olivia from St Clair (who, almost wild 
 with rage, had vainly striven to do so), he 
 added, " but I entreat you will take care 
 
 of this unfortunate." — " Colonel L !'* 
 
 faintly exclaimed Olivia, and fainted in 
 the arras of the Major. St. Clair follow- 
 ed the Colonel to a small opening near the 
 fishing-house, who, turning round, said in 
 a collected manner, " Mr. St. Clair, give 
 me your attention for a few minutes." 
 The tranquillity of the Colonel's air calm- 
 ed the perturbation of St. Clair's spirits ; 
 he bowed slightly. " All recrimination,'* 
 said the Colonel, in a firm and decided tone, 
 *' would now be idle and vain ; nor shall 
 I expatiate upon a mode of conduct the 
 turpitude of which you cannot defend, and 
 which it must be painful to me to dwell on 1 
 In brief, then, you have injured me, Mr. 
 St. Clair, in the nicest point that one man 
 can injure another; you have disregarded 
 the ties of affinity, you have violated the 
 rites of hospitality, you have tainted the 
 principles and murdered the peace of an 
 amiable woman, you have frustrated the 
 K 6 hopes 
 
228 
 
 hopes and destroyed the almost realized 
 expectations of two noble families; you 
 have added the deepest dissimulaiioii to 
 the deepest criminality ; under the cha- 
 racter of a man of sentiment you have 
 acted the part of a libertine; and while 
 the terms, virtue, honour, and independ- 
 ence, animated your conversation, dcc( p- 
 tion, artifice, and villany, iijfluenced your 
 conduct: nay. Sir, hear me out; I come 
 not here as an assassin, but as a man in- 
 jured beyond all reparation, to oppose my 
 life to yours ; you see 1 am come prepared 
 too." He presented a pistol and charge 
 to St. Clair, who took it with an air of 
 the wildest insanity, and, in a tone of 
 
 frenzy, he exclaimed, " Colonel L , 
 
 I will not fight you !" 
 
 '' Not fTgbt me !" reiterated the Colo- 
 rel : '* if you wish to give the affair pub- 
 licity, I will meet you, when and where 
 you please ; but if you mean to add cow- 
 ardice to villany, go, I give you your 
 life ! retire with it to some obscure corner 
 of the earth, where its baleful example 
 
 may not infect the species, and " 
 
 Wild, even to madness, St. Clair re- 
 treated a few paces, and, franticly charg- 
 ing the instrument of death, he exclaim- 
 ed, '' Now, Sir, our injuries are mutual !'* 
 They exchanged shots ; St. Clair's passed 
 over the Colonel's shoulder, and slightly 
 
 grazed 
 
229 
 
 grazed his arm ; that of the Colonel was 
 lodged in the breast of St. Clair. At that 
 moment Olivia recovered from her insen- 
 sibility, and breaking from the arms of 
 the Major, she rushed to the spot. The 
 report of the pistols had brought some 
 peasants, who were walking near it, there 
 also, some of whom alarmed (he servants 
 of the Abbey ; and the circumstance 
 reaching the ears of Sir Patrick Desmond, 
 accompanied by a large party of gentle- 
 men, who had dined with him, he hurri- 
 ed to the place. What a scene presented 
 itself! Weltering in his blood, and sup- 
 ported in the arms of a servant, lay the 
 unfortunate St. Clair ; over him in speech- 
 less agony, hung Olivia, while the Major 
 vainly endeavoured to draw her from the 
 melancholy object : at a little distance, a 
 servant was tying up the bleeding arm of 
 the Colonel, who leaned for support 
 against the trunk of a tree, his eyes fixed 
 on Olivia and St. Clair. The flambeaux 
 which the servants had brought out cast a 
 lurid glare on the scene, and all was silent 
 horror and consternation. With an eifoit 
 of strength, which frequently precedes 
 dissolution, the dying St. Clair raised 
 himself in the arms of the man who sup- 
 ported him, and catching the hands of 
 Olivia with the firm grasp of death, and 
 fixing his glazed eyes on her face, ex- 
 pired 
 
piled without a groan. The body of the 
 unfortunate St. Clair was carried to the 
 fishing-house; Olivia in a state of insen- 
 sibility was conveyed in her grandfather's 
 arms to the Abbey, and followed thither 
 
 by the Colonel and Major L , with 
 
 the rest ot the gentlemen. When Olivia 
 was consigned to the care of her female 
 attendants, the Colonel retired with Sir 
 Patrick and two mutual friends. After a 
 conference of near an hour, he mounted 
 a horse that was in waiting for him, and 
 returned to the Castle. Two days after 
 he set off for England ; and though the 
 reports which the whole affair occasioned 
 were various, idle, and improbable, it 
 was generally believed that the marriage 
 was entirely broken off, that Olivia and 
 St. Clair had carried on for some time a 
 criminal intercourse, and that a duel had 
 taken place in consequence of the Colonel 
 having detected them together a day or 
 two previous to his nuptials. 
 
 The body of St. Clair was consigned 
 to the earth the day after his dissolution ; 
 and the unfortunate Olivia soon lost a 
 sense of her misery in the delirium of a 
 raging fever. In the ravings of her in- 
 sanity, though she frequently dwelt on 
 the cause of her recent sorrows, the name 
 of her father more frequently hovered on 
 her lipSj than that of her lover : that un- 
 happy 
 
happy father but too soon learnt the ex- 
 tent of his child's wretchedness, and the 
 cruel exaggeration of mahcious report 
 blasted her ruined fame in his ears, yet he 
 beheved her innocent, for he had reared 
 her virtuous. He arrived at the Abbey 
 in all the agony of parental affliction, 
 invulnerable to every emotion less poig- 
 nant than that which his child excited, and 
 careless of the reception he should meet 
 with from its owner. Sir Patrick Des- 
 mond met the husband of one Olivia, and 
 the father of another, with a violent burst 
 of sorrow; the energies of his mind were 
 blunted by age, by sickness, and disap- 
 pointment ; and the common misery of 
 the two unhappy parents dissolved their 
 mutual animosity, and united them in all 
 the sympathy of affliction. The restora- 
 tion of Olivia's senses was slow, her re- 
 covery still slower, and in its progress 
 evinced that the foundation of her consti- 
 tution was destroyed for ever. Her first 
 interview with her father had nearly occa- 
 sioned a dangerous relapse ; yet her san- 
 guine parents looked (brward with anxi- 
 ous hope to her recovery, from the mo- 
 ment she was able to leave her bed. — 
 Olivia alone knew the certainty of her 
 approaching dissolution ; " It is in vain,' 
 said she with firmness to the physician 
 who attended her, " that your humanity 
 
 \ would 
 
232 
 
 would feed me wilh delusive hopes. I feel 
 within myscir those lurking principles of 
 decay which tell me I cannot long survive 
 the destruction of my peace, my reputa- 
 tion, and my happiness; and I hope I 
 have still sufficient virtue left not to wish 
 it : it would, however, he useless cruelty 
 to my beloved parents to anticipate their 
 mis(^ry. Let my death come when it 
 will, it will fall heavy on them ; and to 
 awaken them to a sense of the destined 
 period of my existence would be only to 
 add the agony of miserable expectation to 
 the settled sorrow of despair." 
 
 1 he physician, who did not think her 
 dancer so imminent as she herself seemed 
 to suppose, good-naturedly replied, that 
 her spirits were more affected than her 
 constitution, and that if they once got her 
 through thevv'inter months She inter- 
 rupted him with a melancholy smile, ex- 
 claiming from Ossian, " The spring shall 
 return with its showers, but no leaf of 
 mine shall arise." She continued to linger 
 in a gentle and almost imperceptible de- 
 cay ; a placid resignation had taken pos- 
 session of her mind, and shed its touching 
 expression over her countenance. Her 
 conversation was calculated to cheer and 
 amuse her parents, as well as to strengthen 
 and prepare their mincls for the heavy ca- 
 lamity which she believed was at no great 
 5 distance ; 
 
233 
 distance ; but she never once made th(i 
 Jate unhappy events of her life the subject 
 of her conversation. She induced her 
 grandfather to settle half the income he 
 had allowed heron her father, and seemed 
 to derive peculiar satisfaction from the cir- 
 cumstance. She sketched out tlie plan of 
 a school for orphan children, which Sir 
 Patrick. Desmond had promised to endow ; 
 and she seemed wholly intent on works of 
 benevolence and utility. 
 
 Being told one morning that the tenant- 
 ry were celebrating, as usual, her grand- 
 father's birthday on the lawn, she had her- 
 self carried to the balcony, and received 
 their congratulations with seeming plea- 
 sure, but with evident emotion. Observing 
 six old pensioners among the crowd, who 
 had been for some time supported by her 
 bounty, she sent them their halt-year's al- 
 lowance in advance. In the evening she 
 called for her harp, which she had not 
 touched since the fatal night when St. 
 Clair last heard it ; she struck with a 
 feeble hand a few mournful chords ; and 
 by a melancholy association of ideas she 
 attempted to play " S^-ar fuint na Compa- 
 nach,*' or. The Parting of Friends. It 
 was the favourite of her grandfather; it 
 had been taught her by her mother. Her 
 fingers trembled on the strings ; her voice 
 died away, and her eyes swam in tears — • 
 . . her 
 
234 
 
 her emotions were infectious ; her grand- 
 father and father were equally alive to the 
 cause — they both wept bitterly. Olivia 
 threw herself into the arms of one parent 
 from those of another. She was the first 
 to recover composure. She affected to 
 treat her feelings as weak and childish, 
 and had her harp sent to her own room, 
 determined, she said, to conquer her weak- 
 ness, and amuse herself in future by play- 
 ing on it. Her emotions, however, had 
 been too powerful for her frame ; she 
 fainted in the arms of her lather, while, 
 with a smile of self accusation, she was 
 deploring that sensibility whose powers she 
 could not resist. The next day she seemed 
 vi-ibly altered ; a hectic flush glowed on 
 her cheek, and lit up her countenance with 
 its VvOntcd animation j and she seemed 
 much interested in something ^she was 
 writing. At a late hour the female attend- 
 ant who slept in a closet within her room, 
 heard her accompanying her harp with 
 her voice. The next morning she was 
 found still seated at it : she was leaning 
 back in her chair; her elbow rested on a 
 written paper that lay on the table by her 
 side : one arm supported her head, the 
 other hung by her side — she was dead. 
 On the desk before her rested a book, 
 in which were transcribed the following 
 words from Ossian, set to music by her- 
 self; 
 
self: ** My sighs arise with the beam of 
 the east, my tears descend with the drops 
 of the night. I was a lovely tree in thy pre- 
 sence, Oscar, with all my branches round 
 me ; but thy death came like a blast of 
 the desert, and laid my green head low. 
 The spring returned with its showers, but 
 of me not a leaf sprung*." 
 
 The written paper alluded to ran as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 OLIVIA TO HER FATHER. 
 
 A SHORT time shall elapse, and the late 
 melancholy circumstances of my life, that 
 now interest and engage the little circle in 
 which I move, shall be given to oolivian. 
 The various and exaggerated reports of the 
 common-place detailer shall expire in their 
 own insignificance ; the invidious observ- 
 ations of idle malice shall lose their venoni 
 in the frequency of reiteration ; and the 
 hand of contemptuous scorn shall drop 
 that finger it can no longer point at aa 
 object, who will have expiated by a pre- 
 mature death the errors of a transient life, 
 and sought for that refuge in the grave the 
 v/orld could not aiford her. 
 
 * Cronia. 
 
 But 
 
aj6 
 
 But tbere is yet a record from \vlii(fi 
 time will not efface the misfortunes of the 
 child ! It is the heart of the father droop- 
 ing over the disappointment of its che- 
 rished hopes ; it will feed and nourish, 
 while it bitterly deplores, the source of its 
 iTiisery. Utjable to separate the crime 
 from the criminal, the fatal connexion wiU 
 awaken the most agonizing emotions ; it 
 will dwell with melancholy delight on the 
 memory of a beloved object ; it will bleed 
 in parental anguish over })er errors and 
 her misfortunes. It is to you then, my 
 father, that I address myself; to you 
 who were to me the mortal representative 
 of the Deity on earth, whose least gift 
 was existence, whose cares were coeval 
 with my life, and v^hose tenderness shall 
 survive its early extinction ; vvho often 
 stood between me and error when caution 
 and prudence had withdrawn their barrier, 
 and to whose heart 1 would not have given 
 a premeditated pang fur the best joy of the 
 most blissful hour of my existence. It is 
 to you then I would offer some extenua- 
 tion of a conduct which cannot be justified, 
 but may admit of a palHation. I would 
 soften the asperity of your regret, by con- 
 vincing you that my love for virtue sur- 
 vived my adherence to her principles ; 
 that when I embraced an ill-fated passion 
 I shrouded its deformity in the delusive 
 
 veil 
 
veil of sentiment ; and that hoverinii even 
 on the very brink, of destruction, I still 
 clung to the bosom of imaginary perfec- 
 tion. 
 
 The child of love and of misfortune, 
 my character received its most prominent 
 features from the peculiar circumstances 
 of my birth. Reared in solitude and fos- 
 tered in the arms of fond indulgence, my 
 affections were limited, but increased by 
 that limitation. As the light strenglhers 
 in refulgence from the contraction of its 
 beams, my soul, alive to every species of 
 tender or animated emotion, was imprac- 
 ticable to the frigid sentiments of tranquil 
 afiection.. With all the sensibility which is 
 the general characteristic of my sex, and 
 which individually was supremely mine ; 
 with an imagination to magnify, and a 
 fancy to colour those outlines but faintly 
 sketched by the finger of reality, I looked 
 on the world rather as I wished it than as 
 it was ; and ray ideas, like my sorrows 
 and my joys, rose beyond the scale of mo- 
 derate feeling and moderate conception. 
 The most rapturous, the most irreclaim- 
 able of enthusiasts, I was doomed to ex- 
 perience the opposite extremes of bliss or 
 misery in all their excesses of poignancy ; 
 and warmly participating in every species 
 of human happiness or human affliction, 
 I was equally alive to the thrill of pleasure 
 
 or 
 
or the pang of woe. Such was the native 
 tone of my character ; it was modulated, 
 not changed, by education. You early 
 dropped the seeds of taste and refinement 
 into my mind, nor found the soil unpropi- 
 tious to their vegetation. Refined sensa- 
 tions, elegant desires, acute perceptions, 
 sprung from their cultivation ; and like a 
 delicate exotic in a foreign clime, whose 
 bloom is tarnished by every beam too ar- 
 dent, by every gale too chill, I timidly 
 struck back upon myself from the freezing 
 blight of unmerited neglect, from the sar- 
 castic notice of ignorance and envy. You 
 sought to render me perfect in a sense in 
 which perfection was misfortune ; and 
 those talents and that information v^'hich 
 rendered me the idol of my own partial 
 family, left me beyond its endearing circle 
 an object of curiosity rather than afifection ; 
 and like a being of another sphere new 
 liofhted on a distant orb, I understood not 
 the world, nor the world me. Early mis- 
 fortune marked the progress of my grow- 
 ing years ; and when the death of my 
 mother and my sequestration from my 
 home threw me a youthful actor on the 
 scene of life, desolate and , unconnected, 
 1 felt myself alone in the universe. Then, 
 too, i felt the misery of possessing feelings 
 so delicately susceptible of every slight, 
 and of a mind whose sensibilities had been 
 
 but 
 
239 
 
 but too carefully nurtured into maturity, 
 which sensitively shrunk back from the 
 rude intercourse of common-place life, and 
 felt to the very quick the sharp reprehen- 
 sion of insolent rank, the rough reproof 
 of vulgar opulence. Oh ! surely, surely, 
 in life's catalogue of moral evils, there is 
 no suffering so insupportable as the pang 
 which illiberal and oppressive ignorance 
 inflicts on the mind of genius and sensibi- 
 lity. I indeed could not boast of the 
 former, but of the latter I had but too 
 large a portion : from a situation which 
 alone can be called the slavery of the 
 mind, I was called to be the acknowledged 
 heiress of the house of Desmond. My 
 new-found parent gave a new pulsation to 
 my heart ; and a quiet acquiescence in an 
 uninterrupted contentment, rendered me 
 equally exempt from the extreme of plea- 
 sure or pain, when a circumstance oc- 
 curred which gave a new colour to my 
 life, and made me the inheritress of my 
 mother's thwarted destiny. I was so for- 
 tunate (shall I not rather say unfortunate ?) 
 as to attract the attention of Colonel L , 
 
 and his evident predilection in my favour 
 revived the wishes of both our families 
 
 that the houses of Desmond and L • 
 
 should be united. I vvas at a time of life. 
 
 when the heart expands to the reception of 
 
 every affection, when the soul is alive to 
 
 3 Ihe 
 
240 
 
 the tcnderest impressions, and the restless 
 fct lings anxiously seek an object to en- 
 gross tlieir thousand glowing sensibilities. 
 The Colonel was in every respect the most 
 superior man I had ever met with, and 
 soon awakened a tenderness in a heart I 
 believed inaccessible to a second love. 
 Virtue sanctioned the passion which was 
 favoured by circumstances, and the desire 
 to heal those wounds mv mother had in- 
 flicted confirmed its duration. The lenoth 
 
 o 
 
 of time which was to elapse previous to 
 our marriage was a state of probation ade- 
 quate to prove the stability of first love ; 
 and the certainty which attended that love 
 was far from being favourable to a passion 
 which, capricious and inconsistent, is che- 
 rished by doubt, strengthened by obstacles, 
 and supported by apprehension. The ab- 
 sence of the Colonel was of some length ; 
 but his affections, like his character, deter- 
 mined, equable, and consistent, were 
 equally incapable of variation or increase ; 
 — but with me the first tklightful effusions 
 of a first passion gradually vanished ; I 
 sighed for that reciprocity of sentiment, that 
 congeniality of taste, that similitude of 
 manner, which can alone give permanency 
 to love. The Colonel was sensible and 
 amiable, and still held the first place in 
 my heart ; but he was far from reaching 
 that standard of pcrlection which 1 had 
 
 roman- 
 
241 
 
 romantically erected within my owa 
 breast. He was not a St. Preux, he was 
 not a Werter, he was not such a man as 
 in an evil moment, when my guardian 
 angel slumbered on his post, became 
 known to me, and was worthy of being 
 known to you. There might 1 rest my 
 eulogium ; from the lirst m.oment of our 
 acquaintance the soothing flattery of self- 
 love taught me to assimilate St. Clair's 
 character with all I most valued in my 
 own ; and I fondly believed that sympathy 
 had drawn our souls together by those in- 
 dissoluble tics which resist the power of 
 time and the opposition of fortune. In- 
 teresting without the affectation of senti- 
 ment, instructive without the ostentatious 
 display of superior acquirement, my new 
 and dangerous friend stole on the heart 
 while he seemed only to aim at the mind ; 
 and while he taught me to love virtue, 
 the passion insensibly deviated from the 
 princ iple to the object who inculcated it ; 
 nor did 1 love it less for loving it most in 
 him, who was its most amiable represent- 
 ative, it v^/as thus the poison of an ill- 
 fated passion insinuated itself into my 
 breast, and reason could urge no argu- 
 ment against (hat sentiment which en- 
 gaged me through the medium of virtue., 
 The feelings to which I had been newly 
 awakened, contrasted with tnose excited 
 L by 
 
24^ 
 
 by my destined husband, were sufficient lo 
 overthrow my beUef in the infaliibihty of 
 lirst love. Yet I still considered myself 
 
 the wife of Colonel L , and bound to 
 
 fulfil a contract to v/hich my heart had 
 once so freely subscribed, and which was 
 to disseminate peace and happiness to those 
 I most loved ; for many a fond tie was in- 
 terwoven in the complicated tissue of my 
 destiny ! I dared not consider one man as 
 a lover while the affianced bride of ano- 
 ther : then the sophistry of the heart ex- 
 erted its powers of delusion ; love assumed 
 the name of sympathy and sentiment, and 
 an intimacy the most impassioned was 
 termed a platonic connexion. 
 
 An intercourse with such a mind as St. 
 Clair's soon became necessary to the happi- 
 ness of my heing : I thought it invigorated, 
 the mind while it soothed the heart ; and 
 I readily believed a tender and delightful 
 sentiment could sulsist between the two 
 sexes, which, less than love and more than 
 friendship should vibrate between the best 
 emotions of both ; partaking of their 
 purest prinM}-lcs, and participating in their 
 more precious delights. I considered such 
 a sentiment as the finest movement of the 
 soul, and alone capable of existing in a 
 mind tl:e most refined and elevated. I did 
 not conceive that a connexion so spiri- 
 tualized was inimical to my character as a 
 5 wife. 
 
ft43 
 wife, nor that the most tenacious husband 
 could object to a friendship that was the 
 best proof of the purity of those hearts that 
 cherished it. In short, there was for me 
 but one road to happiness, and while I 
 wandered in delightful delirium along its 
 flowery labyrinth, 1 closed my eyes to the 
 dreadful vista which terminated its pro- 
 spect. Thus self- deceived, I gave myself 
 up to the most enchanting dreams; and the 
 golden hours that marked the short period 
 of my danfjcrons bliss still dwell on my' 
 memory like a vision that gave me a 
 glimpse of a more beatific life than this 
 world could afford : the mind entered into 
 the wanderings of the heart, the delicacy 
 of sentiment moderated the ardours of 
 passion ; and if Love ever shewed his glow- 
 ing form, it was reposing on the bosom of 
 the Graces. I do not think my unfortunate 
 friend was actuated by principles less pure 
 than those by which i fondly deceived 
 myself; and we both evinced the truth of 
 Lord Bacon's assertion, that " the affec- 
 tions ever carry an appetite to good, as rea- 
 son dolh ; the difference is, affection be- 
 holdeth merely the present ; reason be- 
 holdeth the future and sum of time." We 
 indeed lived for the present, but it was 
 " the life of life." Without the society of 
 one congenial being who could cherish his 
 inherent genius or draw forth his shining 
 
 L 2 qualities. 
 
244 
 
 qualities, Sh Clair eagerly clang to the 
 heart that alone palpitated in unison with 
 his own ; and, while he believed virtue 
 guided him in the choice, he could not ap- 
 prehend that its tendency was vice : but 
 the same hre that warmed his genius in- 
 flamed his passions, and the same sensi- 
 bility of fetjiing that sublimated his heart, 
 awakened it to the most dangerous of emo- 
 tions,— His mind, organized for the more 
 acute and powerful operations of the pas- 
 sions, was impracticable to an effort cf con» 
 eealmcnt or dissimulation ; and the impas- 
 sioned sentiments of fervid and impetuous 
 afJet lions too soon burst hciond the boun- 
 daries of honour and prudence, and, wjiilc 
 they betrayed their own existence, awaken- 
 ed a similar return in a bosom but too 
 much alive to their resistless power. 
 Alas ! the effort of self-deception I had im- 
 posed on myself insensibly ceased to ope- 
 rate ; the sweet approvings of conscious 
 rectitude no longer cheered my mind; the 
 gay simplicity of untarnished innocence, 
 ro longer animated my spirits ; and even 
 the fatal delusions which had usurped 
 their place gradually faded away, and 
 left me the victim of ungovernable pas- 
 sion, more wretched from the struggles of 
 retreating virtue still combating the en- 
 croachments of vice, till its last vital spark 
 was extinguished in the unequal contest : 
 
 and 
 
245 
 
 and oh! the last struggle between virtue 
 and error is the most exquisite refinement 
 on misery the human mind is susceptible 
 of. Sometimes determined to make all 
 known to him who was on the point of 
 being united to me for ever; sometimes 
 on the point of flying to you, and, while 
 I poured ray sorrows and my errors into 
 your bosom, steal from it in return its 
 tranquillity and peace ; and sometimes, 
 oh God ! on the point of sacrificing all to 
 that fatal passion which rose in proportion 
 to those efforts my understanding faintly 
 made towards its extinction ; my life be- 
 came insupportable, and the native ho- 
 nesty of my character subtilizing to the 
 low finesses of dissimulation, forced a 
 smile on my countenance, which still wore 
 that stamp of contentment that no longer 
 dwelt in the heart of which it was once 
 the index. I made an effort to terminate 
 a little correspondence, which, though not 
 always material in its import, still insen- 
 sibly added a ligament to the lines 1 was 
 twining round my soul. I wept over the 
 success of my effort, and deplored the 
 obedience I had extorted. 1 wished to 
 avoid the object of my tenderness, and 
 hoped to be avoided in return. My heart 
 triumphed in the disappointment of my 
 wishes and the frustration of my hopes. 
 Sometimes careless even to volatility, and 
 L 3 cold 
 
240 
 
 cold even to indifference, I fancied my 
 conduct was actuated by prudence ; till 
 love taught me to feel I was only influ- 
 enced by the variety of its unceasing ope- 
 rations, insensibly deviating into coquetry, 
 to maintain that power wliose extinction 
 was feared by the restless anxiety of pas- 
 sion, wliose influence should have been 
 d; strojcd by the exertion of reason and 
 virtue. 
 
 Such was the situation of my mind when 
 the day of my intended marriage with Co- 
 lonel L was fixed. I could not dis- 
 appoint the noble confidence he had placed 
 in the fidelity of my afix!ctions ; 1 could 
 not deprive myself of his esteem, which I 
 yet valiied beyond that of any other hu- 
 man being; 1 could not destroy the fond 
 hopes which had so long animated the 
 heait of my grandfather, or cloud with 
 sorrow and disappointment the lingering 
 beam that shone upon the evening of his 
 life. In short, while my wishes and my 
 thoughts v^ere equally criminal, my con- 
 duct still wore the character of propriety 
 and virtue, until in an evil hour, seduced 
 by opportunity, impelled by passion, two 
 days before that appointed for my mar- 
 riage I deposited the secret of my heart in 
 the bosom of him who had excited it, and 
 at the same moment learnt what I had 
 all along been but too conscious of, what 
 
 I dreaded 
 
247 
 
 I dreaded to reflect on, and died to hear- 
 that 1 was beloved ! beloved by one whose 
 refinement of sentiment, ardour of pas- 
 sion, and stability of mind, render^-d hiin 
 the most delicate, the most ardent, the 
 most unalterable of lovers. Sweet and 
 dangerous was the conviction ; and while 
 it seized on every avenue to my heart, pru- 
 dence, propriety, and peace fled it for ever ! 
 In short, the day previous to that which 
 was to make me the wife of one man, I 
 consented to a private interview with 
 another — what followed you are but too 
 well acquainted with. I have, indeed, 
 escaped some part of the criminality which 
 I doubt not the world, prone to invidious 
 supposition, has attached to my conduct ; 
 a conduct but too culpable, independent 
 of malicious representation. But the wo- 
 man who violates the natural decorums of 
 her sex, which are her virtue's bcvSt safe- 
 guard ; who suffers her moral sense to be 
 vanquished by the sophistry of reasoning" 
 vice ; and who nourishes a criminal passion 
 under the guise of sentiment, has little to 
 boast of personal preservation ; when the 
 most sacred recess of the temple becomes 
 polluted, it the vestibule escapes violation 
 it must owe its security to accident. 
 
 In unfolding to you, my revered parent, 
 the progress of my love, and of my conse- 
 quent misfortunes, I have insensibly dis- 
 played 
 
24^ 
 
 played by what imperceptible gradations 
 virtue sinks into vice ; that to be guihy it 
 is not requisite to be inherently bad ; and 
 that error of conduct has no inseparable 
 connexion with depravity of character. 
 Oh you ! author of my existence, and, still 
 more, father of my mind, which was 
 formed under the cuhure of your fostering 
 care; you who best illustrated virtue by 
 your example, and cimfirmed its empire 
 in my heart by your precepts, you best 
 know how dearly I loved virtue for virtue's 
 sake ; and yet the weak, the ignorant, the 
 vicious mind, by the indulgence of its 
 most pernicious propensities, could not 
 have "produced effects more prejudicial to 
 the peace and well-being of society, than 
 I have done by resigning myself to the 
 first impulse of my passions, and by per- 
 verting the faculties of my reason to sanc- 
 tion the errors of my inclination. 
 
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 PERSIAN LYRICS, 
 
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 THE DIVVAN-I-HAFIZ; 
 
 W I T H 
 
 PARAPHRASES IN VERSE AND PROSF, 
 
 This Work will he found of great Use to Students 
 
 in the Persian Language. 
 
 Quarto, Price 15s. 
 
BOOKS PUBLISHED BT E. HARDING^ 
 
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 Three Vols. Octavo. Price il. lis. 6d. 
 each Volume. 
 
 A 
 PRINT, 
 
 BEAUTIFULLY ENGRAVED IN CHALK, 
 
 BY A. E, HOGG, 
 FROM 
 
 A VALUABLE PAINTING IN THE COLLECTION 
 OF 
 
 EARL ONSLOW, 
 
 It represents the House of Commoks; 
 Speaker Onslow in the Chair, Sir Robert 
 Walpole in the Act of speaking, SidneV 
 GoDOLPHiN, Father of the House, and many 
 other Members. 
 
 The Figures are painted by Hogarth, and the 
 architectural Part by Sir James Thornhill, whose 
 Portrait is introduced. 
 
 The Size of the Print is 14 Inches and a Half 
 by 17. 
 
 The Price of the Prints il. is. ; Proofs 
 il. IIS. (}d. 
 
 The Ndhllity and Gentry may be supplied 
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