CHAPTER VI. Booth in their masterly deliniations of the Mr. West, when he married Julia Gra- Monday, the third day after the child's ham, loved her not according to the gedecease, was fixed upon for the burial. neral acceptation of the word but with a The hearse, with its dark, hangings and fervour approaching idolatry. His feel-mute driver, stood before the door. Friend ings towards her were of the most exalted afier friend gathered around the mansion, kind delicate, and tender in their nature from the city in carriages and from the pure as the chrystal stream of waters, neighbourhood on foot. Mr, West refuand as sweet as the tones of an Eolian sed to attend the funeral-refused, nor harp. As over the strings of the harp the would he assign any reason--they persua summer-breeze trembles, with its dying ca- ded, hut no, he would not--and the train dence and its rich deep tones-melting was consequently obliged to proceed withmusical; so it was with Theodore's love out him. Previous to his starting, Clark all gentleness-devotion--fondness! whispered in private to his fellow-servants To him a wife seemed something more the expediency of some one remaining with than an earthly being something purer-him in the absence of the rest. "In his something holier -Besides, he was in a present disordered state of mind," he said, great measure the creature of impulse, and "it will not be prudent to leave him alone. born with sensibilities, naturally superior He may possibly. he tempted to suicide. to those ordinarily characteristic of the hu- Once before he attempted his life, and in orman species, why he became so easily the der to prevent a result of the kind, I will dupe of misrepresentation, is a conclusion myself volunteer to remain." It was ac not at all difficult for us to arrive at. His cordingly agreed that Clark should stay. fault in the present case was the error of As the funeral left, the parent of the child hasty judgment, acted upon by the light- about to be buried, stood under the piazza, ning-like feelings of a warm and youthful watching the slow and solemn train till it heart-youth is necessarily without expe- disappeared from his sight. Turning into rience. But this only serves in some de- the house he was followed by Clark, and gree to palliate the circumstance-not to giving way to his dispair, called for the excuse it. Had he paused, as he should cup of intoxication. "Wine! wine!" he have done, for reflection, he would have exclaimed "Give me the glass-these acted differently-his wife would not have miseries are more than I can bear !" As been obliged to leave him, as she did, nor he spoke, he pressed his hand convulsivewould he have experienced those conflict, ly against his forehead, and his heavy ing tortures of the mind beneath the lash of breathings betokened the weight of sorwhich he was hourly writhing. row under which he laboured. "My child! By the side of his dying child he watch my child!" he bitterly exclaimed, and coned, unremittingly, till it breathed its last tinued to repeat her name with words of and when finally convinced that the spark affection and regret."I have lost her! of life was extinct, his grief, was excessive, lost her!" were his words, and deep and -vehement and even blasphemous! To passionate the accents of his grief.. "Mo this succeeded despondency. After the ther and child both gone-both from my storm of passion the gloom of despair sight-and I am left a wreck amidst the in its repose more aweful than in the yio- barren waste of life!". For a moment he lence of commotion, Upon the bed beside paused, subdued by the intensity of his the corpse he sat, with his eyes fixed upon sorrow, and bursting into tears wept like the inanimate form, nor could any entrea- a child. A smile spread over the counties prevail on him to leave the room. He tenance of Clark-the triumphat one of villany! His victim again called force, but with the utmost reluctance. Du- for wine.. Glass after glass of it he conring this scene Clark was standing in the tinued to swallow his senses forsook chamber, a little apart from the group, him-he staggered-reeled-and in hys. smiling with malicious satisfaction as he terical convulsions, fell prostrate upon the witnessed the grief his master displayed- floor.. was finally taken out-not exactly by ssful the whole reminding us. of a scene in Now-now I triumph," cried the maShakspeare's Othello, and of Forrest and lignant Clark, who had been careful to ply his victim with the inebriating draughts, to witness, and so departed for Europe. expecting the present result. I triumph There I planned the scheme I have since now! Like dark-eyed Zanga over Alon- executed. After the absence of a year I zo's prostrate body I stand-like Zanga returned to the United States-intent upon too, I must awake my victim into horrors! one thing-the destruction of your felicity. What, ho! arise"-jerking the other by In the first place, to arouse your suspithe coat collar and endeavouring to rouse cions, I loitered about these premises, him from his stupor. night after right, with the flute and guitar, It is painful to speak of Mr. West in the playing, and at times accompanying the situation he is here before the reader. But instrument with my voice. In your Spadisagreeable as it is, it is unavoidably ne- nish servant, Manuel Garcia, I found a cessary. The thread of the narrative ex-ready abettor for the gold I supplied him acts it. Intoxicated and insensible as he with; and at my desire, he whispered in was, such was the 'vehemence of Clark's your ears the lying tale that so easily fired language, that it startled him; and half your breast with jealousy." opening his eyes, he encountered the other's At this barefaced confession, it may demoniacal gaze. "Your child died by poison"— "Poison !"* readily be supposed, Mr. West was thunderstruck. He was so; and with speechless amazement and impatience awaited "Ay, sir-poison!-and I administered while Byard continued as follows. "Worn the fatal drug." out as it were by your harsh treatment, "You !" her affection for you seemed to be sus"Yes me! Behold me!" he cried, pended, and to leave you became the pretearing off his 'whiskers and false hair, vailing desire of your wife's bosom. Mandisplaying the light-coloured ringlets he uel discovered it-disclosed to me the senaturally possessed, instead of the jet cret, and at my bidding, proffered his asblack curls of a wig--and revealing to sistance, which she unhesitatingly acceptthe astonishment of his hearered of. A plan for her escape was then "Byard?" agreed upon, and a night not far distant "Yes-Byard-your wife's cousin, and appointed to put it into effect. She was your own eternal ehemy! 'Twas I that to be rowed across the river, there to take poisoned your child,-'twas I that mur- a carriage, which was to be in waiting. dered it,". The night settled upon arrived. I had a "You-for what?" schooner I hired, ready at anchor in the "For revenge!"-thundering out his stream, a mile below, and dressed in the words, and forcing a laugh of fiendish ex- garb of a sailor, I waited with a boat at ultation, whilst his mouth foamed with the the designated spot. She came down with excitement of his passions-"for revenge! Manuel, entered the boat, and was entraprevenge!" Here a momentary pause en-ped on board of the vessel. We got unsued, during which they intently and ear- der weigh, sailed immediately from the nestly gazed at each other-the one tre- river, and as soon as we were out at sea, mulous with awe-the other scowling with I attempted" the dark and vindictive spirit of wicked determination. Mr. West rose to his feet, "Impossible!" "Yes-I did-but own that I found her and was for leaving the room, but Byard virtue impregnable. My endeavours she intercepted him, placing himself against resisted-it enraged me and rather than the door, and imperatively bidding the that she should ever get again to your other to remain where he was. "Hear arms, I determined to-ay!-and now she me," he said, or rather vociferated. "You sleeps beneath a watery grave!" married my cousin-Julia Graham: "Dead?" loved her! and when her preference was "She is-she is!-murdered!" fixed upon you, I felt the demon rankle in At the announcement of this, an exclamy bosom-the demon that actuates me mation of horror escaped from the lips of now. However, I managed to smother Theodore, and his uplifted hands were my feelings at the time, and even officia-clasped with the energy of despair! His ted as groomsman at your nuptials. But wile's innocence was now declared beyond your increasing happiness I could not bear a doubt, and as he thought over the wrongs she had received-of the sorrows he had sorrow, there was about her that indicahimself been the cause of he groaned tion of inward gentility which prosperity with remorse! Remorse! remorse! and cannot give,, nor misfortune take away. his groans were music to the exulting vil- She was a strange, wayward being, and lany of Byard. But at this crisis-in the would wander sometimes for days togeth very midst of his triumph, the door of the er,.without regard to season or weather, room was burst open, and Garcia, with upon the rocks, and take no notice of any several police officers, entered. "There thing that might be said to her; and at he is-seize him-" other times, she would sit rocking herself "Ha! traitor!" cried Byard. Drawing on the low wooden seat, gazing upon vaa loaded pistol from his breast-pocket, he cancy, and muttering at intervals a few levelled it at Garcia and fired, who in- low indistinct words. Her appearance stantly fell upon the floor, drenched in heightened her singularity; she had been blood! The officers secured the perpe tall and beautiful, but her features: now trator of the deed, who made no resistance, had a hard, harsh outline, and except in as he knew well enough it would be fruit- her eyes, which were large, black, and less to do so. piercing, there was no trace of beauty "Hear me,"gasped the dying Span- left. iard faintly, at the moment recovering suf- She had unintentionally inspired the cot. ficient strength to raise himself on one tagers dwelling near her with a degree of hand"I am the murderer of the tavern awe, which gradually deepened into su keeper-killed-Baltimore--year-eigh-perstition. It was seldom that any one teen-twenty-five-" uttering which, he addressed her. She shunned them all, and sunk back and expired.. the name of "Old Mary." was sufficient Byard was conveyed to prison. The to terrify the children into good behavior: coroner was sent for, and a verdict given there was no cause for this fear, for she over the corpse of Manuel, which was was gentle and even kind to those who then taken to the city for burial. To be continued. OLD MARY. OR, THE PERILS OF WOMAN. "I saw a stream whose waves were bright This life to me hath been."" did speak to her; but she was unfortunate, which is a sufficient reason for her want of friends. She had lately, however, been enlivened by the visits of a young girl whom she had known in infancy she had left her native village while a child, and returned to it a blooming girl.. Almost her first inquiry was for "Old Mary," who, when she came, received her with a wel come such as only those can give who feel that they are deserted and dreaded by all beside. But to return. The old woman had sat in her desolate home with no 'compan-. It was a stormy night in December: ion but her own gloomy thoughts, when the wind blew.furiously, against a little hut, she heard a gentle tap at her door she.. which from its decayed state and its ap- was unaccustomed to visitors, and her. proximation to the sea, whose waves.al-question of "who is there?" was asked most washed it, appeared unfit for the ha- sharply. "Only me, only Rose," was the bitation of any human being. Yet there answer, and the girl entered. It is a one poor melancholy.creature lived: The dreadful stormy night, and I thought you hovel was into two rooms, one of which would feel lonely, so I have .come, to sit was quite empty, and the other contained with you," she continued, as she took her two chairs, a low stool, and a table of the seat by the old woman, who greeted her very meanest appearance. Although in- fonlly. They conversed for a few min tensely cold, there were but a few dying utes, when a sudden gust of wind, louder embers in the grate, opposite to which than any that had preceded it, caused Rose was seated the living inhabitant-an old to, draw nearer to her companion and woman; very old and poor. Still, bowed cling to her as though in fear. Old Mary down as she was by age, and want and put her arm round her and said, "Do not fear, gentle one, you are quite safe." Awhile he slept, till I have fancied him an pause ensued. Mary gazed upon the beau-angel: With difficulty have I restrained tiful face of the maiden, and broke the myself from straining him to my heart, silence by saying, "You have often asked lest the bright spirit should take wing even me to tell you my tale, Rose, and you while I gazed and folded him in my emshall now be gratified.. 'Tis a tale fit to brace. But in this Į sinned, and for this be, told only on a hight like this." There also have I suffered.. Even. a mother's was another pause of a moment, and the fondness must have bounds; but mine had old woman resumed: none; it was the one only feeling in my to I was, but a child when I was married heart, and it grew to idolatry! tono matter whom, suffice it, we irre-" My Henry grew to manhood. At. vocably offended our friends on both sides. three and twenty he was betrothed to a Most severely was I punished for my dis: maiden in our village, three years younger obedience. I had been a wife but two, than himself, and it was settled that she years, when the playmate of my infancy, was to become his wife in a twelvemonth. the object of my girl-hood's dreams, the I tried hard to love her for his sake, but husband of my youth, was snatched from God forgive me! I had much to school me in the flush of youth, and health and my heart to, to prevent its hating her, pride! To be called away so soon! but though Henry never guessed it. About I must not think of it;-he died, and with this time a stranger came from him all my happiness-even, the wish for reside for a short time in the village. My it. My life was despaired of; I cared not boy soon found or fancied a degree of for life, but hoped and prayed for death; coolness on the part of his betrothed. I but it mooked me death is only for the remember well his words one evening on happy and the gay; he is not satisfied to his return home, after fruitlessly watching visit those who daily-hourly long for his for her. It is the second time she has approach Twas a sinful wish-and great broken her engagement with me this week, has been my punishment! and I have reason to believe in favor of "After a time my grief became less this stranger. Mother, if Ellen Thornton violent, but not less sincere. I had now play me false, I' he stopped, hesitated, amative to induce, me to be more careful and' turned away. The time of my misof my health-I.found that I was to be- ery drew near, Ellen was to be seen daily come a mother. Here, then, was some-walking with the stranger, who, not conthing for which to live;. my existence tented with his victory, sought every opwould not now be a blank, a monotonous portunity to quarrel with the man he had sorrow. The time came at last when I so grossly wronged. . could take.my baby to my bosom, and feel "It was a night like this-the rain pourthat I was not alone. Oh, the wild ecstasy ed in torrents and the thunder reverberatof that moment! I could have knelt to ed through the cottage, but what are the my unconscious infant and blessed him for convulsions of nature in all her terrors the joy I felt. I was then but a niere girl; compared to the angry passions of men? friends had for ever forsaken me, fortune But as murmuring rills to the stormy Thad none; I was surrounded by perils ocean. It was past his usual hour for reand temptations, but my child was the turning, and I became uneasy. Fears the counter spell to all of them, and .I loved most, improbable run across my mind. him dearer and better, the more I endured The lightning might have struck him; he for him. might have ventured too near the edge of We must, we are compelled to love the rocks and have fallen into the sea; those who depend on us for protection, be every thing in short but the truth found it ever so trifling, how much then must I pace in my imagination. Another hour have loved my child? passed away. I could bear it no longer. "I left my home and struggled for years Regardless of the weather, I rushed out, I with Poverty that he might want for no- wandered in every direction, but met him. thing we, were all in all to each other. not. At last it struck me that he might He grew in beauty as well as in years; it have returned home, and be uneasy at my might be that I saw him in too fond a absence; I almost kept pace with the lightlight but I have sat and gazed upon him ning's swiftness, and was soon within |