Charles Brockden Brown

“ There is a mother whom grief has, for a time, deprived of life. She has been oppressed and betrayed; been robbed of property and reputation—but not of innocence. She is worthy of relief. Have you arms to receive her? Have you sympathy, protection, and a home to bestow upon a forlorn, betrayed, and unhappy stranger? I know not what this house is; I suspect it to be no better than a brothel. I know not what treatment this woman has received. When her situation and wants are ascertained, will you supply her wants? Will you rescue her from evils that may attend her continuance here? ”

“ I addressed myself to Welbeck:—
"Your resolution to remain is hasty and rash. By persisting in it, you will add to the miseries of my condition; you will take away the only hope that I cherished. But, however you may act, Colvill or I must be banished from this roof. What is the league between you? Break it, I conjure you, before his frauds have involved you in inextricable destruction."
Welbeck looked at me with some expression of doubt.
"I mean," continued I, "the man whose voice I heard above. He is a villain and betrayer. I have manifold proofs of his guilt. Why does he linger behind you? ”

“ No wonder that I struggled to repel it; that I fostered the doubt whether money was the only instrument of benefit; whether caution, and fortitude, and knowledge, were not the genuine preservatives from evil. Had I not the means in my hands of dispelling her fatal ignorance of Welbeck and of those with whom she resided? Was I not authorized, by my previous though slender intercourse, to seek her presence?
Suppose I should enter Mrs. Villars's house, desire to be introduced to the lady, accost her with affectionate simplicity, and tell her the truth? Why be anxious to smooth the way? ”

“ Might I not gain the knowledge of beings whose virtue was the gift of experience and the growth of knowledge? who joined to the modesty and charms of woman the benefits of education, the maturity and steadfastness of age, and with whose character and sentiments my own would be much more congenial than they could possibly be with the extreme youth, rustic simplicity, and mental imperfections of Eliza Hadwin?
To say truth, I was now conscious of a revolution in my mind. I can scarcely assign its true cause. No tokens of it appeared during my late retreat to Malverton. ”

“ Her looks betrayed the deepest consternation and anxiety. Her eyes in a moment were fixed by the decayed form and the sad features of Clemenza. She shuddered at this spectacle, but was silent. She stood in the midst of the floor, fluctuating and bewildered. I dropped the hand that I was holding, and approached her.
"You have come," said I, "in good season. I know you not, but will believe you to be good. You have a heart, it may be, not free from corruption, but it is still capable of pity for the miseries of others. You have a hand that refuses not its aid to the unhappy. ”

“ Welbeck! Would that my first words could strike thee dead! They will so, if thou hast any title to the name of man.
"'My sister is dead; dead of anguish and a broken heart. Remote from her friends; in a hovel; the abode of indigence and misery.
"'Her husband is no more. He returned after a long absence, a tedious navigation, and vicissitudes of hardships. He flew to the bosom of his love; of his wife. She was gone; lost to him, and to virtue. In a fit of desperation, he retired to his chamber and despatched himself. ”

“ To die, and leave behind me this train of enormous perils, must not be.
"O Clemenza! O Mervyn! Ye have not merited that I should leave you a legacy of persecution and death. Your safety must be purchased at what price my malignant destiny will set upon it. The cord of the executioner, the note of everlasting infamy, is better than to leave you beset by the consequences of my guilt. It must not be."
Saying this, Welbeck cast fearful glances at the windows and door. He examined every avenue and listened. Thrice he repeated this scrutiny. ”

“ It will preclude the necessity of performing the office for myself. I have injured you, and merit all that your vengeance can inflict. I know your nature too well to believe that my death will be perfect expiation. When the gust of indignation is past, the remembrance of your deed will only add to your sum of misery; yet I do not love you well enough to wish that you would forbear. I desire to die, and to die by another's hand rather than my own.'
"'Coward!' exclaimed Watson, with augmented vehemence, 'you know me too well to believe me capable of assassination. ”

“ The vivid portrait which Mervyn had drawn was conspicuous in the sunken and haggard visage before me. This face had, indeed, proportions and lines which could never be forgotten or mistaken. Welbeck, when once seen or described, was easily distinguished from the rest of mankind. He had stronger motives than other men for abstaining from guilt, the difficulty of concealment or disguise being tenfold greater in him than in others, by reason of the indelible and eye-attracting marks which nature had set upon him. ”

“ Why should I live? I must vanish from that stage which I had lately trodden. My flight must be instant and precipitate. To be a fugitive from exasperated creditors, and from the industrious revenge of Watson, was an easy undertaking; but whither could I fly, where I should not be pursued by the phantoms of remorse, by the dread of hourly detection, by the necessities of hunger and thirst? In what scene should I be exempt from servitude and drudgery? Was my existence embellished with enjoyments that would justify my holding it, encumbered with hardships and immersed in obscurity? ”

“ You, my friends, who have not seen Eliza Hadwin, cannot conceive what effect this entreaty was adapted to produce in me. She has surely the sweetest voice, the most speaking features, and most delicate symmetry, that ever woman possessed. Her guileless simplicity and tenderness made her more enchanting. To be the object of devotion to a heart so fervent and pure was, surely, no common privilege. Thus did she tender me herself; and was not the gift to be received with eagerness and gratitude?
No. I was not so much a stranger to mankind as to acquiesce in this scheme. ”

“ How little I suspected the nature of the conflict in his heart, between a new passion and the claims of pride; of conscience and of humanity; the claims of a child and a wife; a wife, already in affliction, and placing all that yet remained of happiness, in the firmness of his virtue; in the continuance of his love; a wife, at the very hour of his meditated flight, full of terrors at the near approach of an event whose agonies demand a double share of a husband's supporting, encouraging love——
"Good Heaven! For what evils are some of thy creatures reserved! ”

“ When I reflected on that tissue of nice contingencies which led him to my door, and enabled me to save from death a being of such rare endowments, my heart overflowed with joy, not unmingled with regrets and trepidation. How many have been cut off by this disease, in their career of virtue and their blossom-time of genius! How many deeds of heroism and self-devotion are ravished from existence, and consigned to hopeless oblivion!
I had saved the life of this youth. This was not the limit of my duty or my power. Could I not render that life profitable to himself and to mankind? ”

“ She, alas! has full employment for her tears in watering the grave of her child."
He started. "What! dead? Say you that the child is dead?"
"It is dead. I witnessed its death. I saw it expire in the arms of its mother; that mother whom I formerly met under your roof blooming and gay, but whom calamity has tarnished and withered. I saw her in the raiment of poverty, under an accursed roof: desolate; alone; unsolaced by the countenance or sympathy of human beings; approached only by those who mock at her distress, set snares for her innocence, and push her to infamy. ”

“ Indigence and dishonour were the evils to shun which thy integrity and peace of mind have been lightly forfeited. Thou hast found that the price was given in vain; that the hollow and deceitful enjoyments of opulence and dignity were not worth the purchase; and that, frivolous and unsubstantial as they are, the only path that leads to them is that of honesty and diligence. Thou art in prison and art sick; and there is none to cheer thy hour with offices of kindness, or uphold thy fainting courage by the suggestions of good counsel. For such as thou the world has no compassion. ”

“ There are many who will regard my conduct as the last refinement of temerity, or of heroism. Nothing, indeed, more perplexes me than a review of my own conduct. Not, indeed, that death is an object always to be dreaded, or that my motive did not justify my actions; but of all dangers, those allied to pestilence, by being mysterious and unseen, are the most formidable. To disarm them of their terrors requires the longest familiarity. Nurses and physicians soonest become intrepid or indifferent; but the rest of mankind recoil from the scene with unconquerable loathing. ”

“ I look back upon that allotment of my destiny which first led me to his door, with gratitude and pleasure.
"Would to heaven," continued I, somewhat changing my tone, "intercourse with Welbeck had been as harmless to all others as it has been to me! that no injury to fortune and fame, and innocence and life, had been incurred by others greater than has fallen upon my head! There is one being, whose connection with him has not been utterly dissimilar in its origin and circumstances to mine, though the catastrophe has, indeed, been widely and mournfully different. ”

“ Is it rational to cherish the hope of thy restoration to innocence and peace? Thou art no obdurate criminal; hadst thou less virtue, thy compunctions would be less keen. Wert thou deaf to the voice of duty, thy wanderings into guilt and folly would be less fertile of anguish. The time will perhaps come, when the measure of thy transgressions and calamities will overflow, and the folly of thy choice will be too conspicuous to escape thy discernment. Surely, even for such transgressors as thou, there is a salutary power in the precepts of truth and the lessons of experience. ”

“ My purposes were honest and steadfast. Every sense was the inlet of pleasure, because it was the avenue of knowledge; and my soul brooded over the world to ideas, and glowed with exultation at the grandeur and beauty of its own creations.
This felicity was too rapturous to be of long duration. I gradually descended from these heights; and the remembrance of past incidents, connected with the images of your family, to which I was returning, led my thoughts into a different channel. Welbeck and the unhappy girl whom he had betrayed; Mrs. Villars and Wallace, were recollected anew. ”

“ You do yourself injustice, my friend. I think I see your most secret thoughts; and these, instead of exciting anger or contempt, only awaken compassion and tenderness. You love; and must, therefore, conceive my conduct to be perverse and cruel. I counted on your harbouring such thoughts. Time only and reflection will enable you to see my motives in their true light. Hereafter you will recollect my words, and find them sufficient to justify my conduct. You will acknowledge the propriety of my engaging in the cares of the world before I sit down in retirement and ease. ”

“ Whatever should happen in consequence of my being immured in the chamber, and of the loss of my clothes and of the portrait of my friend, I had bound myself to silence. These inquietudes, however, were transient. I trusted that these events would operate auspiciously; but my curiosity was now awakened as to the motives which Welbeck could have for exacting from me this concealment. To act under the guidance of another, and to wander in the dark, ignorant whither my path tended and what effects might flow from my agency, was a new and irksome situation. ”

“ What had no connection with the history of Welbeck and with the part that I have acted upon this stage I thought it proper to omit. My omission was likewise prompted by other reasons. My mind is enervated and feeble, like my body. I cannot look upon the sufferings of those I love without exquisite pain. I cannot steel my heart by the force of reason, and by submission to necessity; and, therefore, too frequently employ the cowardly expedient of endeavouring to forget what I cannot remember without agony. ”

“ Wallace might, perhaps, experience this pest in its most lenient degree; but the desertion of all mankind, the want not only of medicines but of food, would irrevocably seal his doom. My imagination was incessantly pursued by the image of this youth, perishing alone, and in obscurity; calling on the name of distant friends, or invoking, ineffectually, the succour of those who were near.
Hitherto distress had been contemplated at a distance, and through the medium of a fancy delighting to be startled by the wonderful, or transported by sublimity. ”

“ Glancing vaguely at the countenance of Watson, my attention was arrested by a convulsive motion in the eyelids. This motion increased, till at length the eyes opened, and a glance, languid but wild, was thrown around. Instantly they closed, and the tremulous appearance vanished.
I started from my place and was on the point of uttering some involuntary exclamation. At the same moment, Welbeck seemed to recover from his reverie.
"How is this?" said he. "Why do we linger here? Every moment is precious. We cannot dig for him a grave with our hands. ”

“ This suspicion, however, yielded to his earnest and repeated declarations. If Colvill were not here, where had he made his abode? How came friendship and intercourse between Welbeck and him? By what miracle escaped the former from the river, into which I had imagined him forever sunk?
"I will answer you," said he, with candour. "You know already too much for me to have any interest in concealing any part of my life. You have discovered my existence, and the causes that rescued me from destruction may be told without detriment to my person or fame. ”

“ I spoke with mildness and composure:—
"Mr. Welbeck, you are unfortunate and criminal. Would to God I could restore you to happiness and virtue! but, though my desire be strong, I have no power to change your habits or rescue you from misery.
"I believed you to be dead. I rejoice to find myself mistaken. While you live, there is room to hope that your errors will be cured; and the turmoils and inquietudes that have hitherto beset your guilty progress will vanish by your reverting into better paths. ”

“ I hastened, therefore, to a distance, and shrouded myself in the friendly secrecy of my own chamber.
The constitution of my mind is doubtless singular and perverse; yet that opinion, perhaps, is the fruit of my ignorance. It may by no means be uncommon for men to fashion their conclusions in opposition to evidence and probability, and so as to feed their malice and subvert their happiness. Thus it was, in an eminent degree, in my case. The simple fact was connected, in my mind, with a train of the most hateful consequences. The depravity of Welbeck was inferred from it. ”

“ To recall her to life was my first duty; but I was powerless, or unacquainted with the means. I gazed upon her features, and endeavoured, by pressing her in my arms, to inspire her with some warmth. I looked towards the road, and listened for the wished-for sound of some carriage that might be prevailed on to stop and receive her. Nothing was more improbable than that either pleasure or business would induce men to encounter so chilling and vehement a blast. To be lighted on by some traveller was, therefore, a hopeless event.
Meanwhile, Eliza's swoon continued, and my alarm increased. ”

“ But, thank Heaven, the storm has disappeared before the age of sensibility has gone past, and without drying up every source of happiness. You are still young; all your powers unimpaired; rich in the compassion and esteem of the world; wholly independent of the claims and caprices of others; amply supplied with that means of usefulness, called money; wise in that experience which only adversity can give. Past evils and sufferings, if incurred and endured without guilt, if called to view without remorse, make up the materials of present joy. ”

“ I cannot imagine what could prompt him to so wearisome an undertaking; but he says that adventures and a destiny so singular as mine ought not to be abandoned to forgetfulness like any vulgar and every-day existence. Besides, when he wrote it, he suspected that it might be necessary to the safety of my reputation and my life, from the consequences of my connection with Welbeck. Time has annihilated that danger. All enmities and all suspicions are buried with that ill-fated wretch. Wortley has been won by my behaviour, and confides in my integrity now as much as he formerly suspected it. ”

“ You defraud yourself of all the happiness redounding from the act of making others happy. You sacrifice substance to show, and are more anxious to prevent unjust aspersions from lighting on yourself, than to rescue a fellow-creature from guilt and infamy.
"You are rich, and abound in all the conveniences and luxuries of life. A small portion of your superfluity would obviate the wants of a being not less worthy than yourself. It is not avarice or aversion to labour that makes you withhold your hand. It is dread of the sneers and surmises of malevolence and ignorance. ”

“ Wickedness may sometimes be ambiguous, its mask may puzzle the observer; our judgment may be made to falter and fluctuate, but the face of Mervyn is the index of an honest mind. Calm or vehement, doubting or confident, it is full of benevolence and candour. He that listens to his words may question their truth, but he that looks upon his countenance when speaking cannot withhold his faith. ”

“ But why should I ruminate, with anguish and doubt, upon the past? The future was within my power, and the road of my duty was too plain to be mistaken. I would disclose to Welbeck the truth, and cheerfully encounter every consequence. I would summon my friend to my aid, and take his counsel in the critical emergency in which I was placed. I ought not to rely upon myself alone in my efforts to benefit this being, when another was so near whose discernment and benevolence, and knowledge of mankind, and power of affording relief, were far superior to mine. ”

“ Since that time my happier lot has cast me among women so far above Eliza Hadwin,—so far above, and so widely different from any thing which time is likely to make her,—that, I own, nothing appears more unlikely than that I shall ever love her."
"Are you not a little capricious in that respect, my good friend? You have praised your Bess as rich in natural endowments; as having an artless purity and rectitude of mind, which somewhat supersedes the use of formal education; as being full of sweetness and tenderness, and in her person a very angel of loveliness." ”

“ Sadness, rather than fury, overspread his features; and his accent, when he spoke to me, was not faltering, but solemn.
"Mervyn," said he, "you comprehend not this scene. Your youth and inexperience make you a stranger to a deceitful and flagitious world. You know me not. It is time that this ignorance should vanish. The knowledge of me and of my actions may be of use to you. It may teach you to avoid the shoals on which my virtue and my peace have been wrecked; but to the rest of mankind it can be of no use. The ruin of my fame is, perhaps, irretrievable ”

“ It instantly engendered a suspicion, that his plunging into the water was an artifice, intended to establish a belief of his death. His own tale had shown him to be versed in frauds, and flexible to evil. But was he not associated with Colvill? and what, but a compact in iniquity, could bind together such men?
While thus musing, Welbeck's countenance and gesture displayed emotions too vehement for speech. The glances that he fixed upon me were unsteadfast and wild. He walked along the floor, stopping at each moment, and darting looks of eagerness upon me. A conflict of passions kept him mute. ”

“ I possessed no means of subsistence. I was unknown to my neighbours, and desired to remain unknown. I was unqualified for manual labour by all the habits of my life; but there was no choice between penury and diligence,—between honest labour and criminal inactivity. I mused incessantly on the forlornness of my condition. Hour after hour passed, and the horrors of want began to encompass me. I sought with eagerness for an avenue by which I might escape from it. The perverseness of my nature led me on from one guilty thought to another. ”