Daniel Jackson

“ The yard gate was locked, of which John had the key. She was confident that no person could ascend or get over the wall of the enclosure. But if that were practicable, how was it possible that any human being could enter the house? She had the key of every door, and they were all fast locked, and yet she had heard them furiously open and shut. A thought darted into her mind,—was it not a plan which her aunt had contrived in order to frighten her to a compliance with her wishes? But then how could she enter the house without keys? ”

“ He had not therefore attended to the words of Melissa’s father with that eagerness which favourable anticipations commonly produce. But when his name was mentioned; when he found he was the choice—the happy favourite of Melissa’s affection, every tender passion of his soul became interested, and was suddenly aroused to the refinements of sensibility. Like an electric shock, it reanimated his whole frame, and vibrated every nerve of his heart. ”

“ Vernon, to see the charmer of my soul. She received me with all the ardency of affection, and even shed tears of joy in my presence. I pressed her to name the day which was to perfect our union and happiness, and the next Sunday, four days only distant, was agreed upon for me to lead her to the altar. How did my heart bound at the prospect of making Miss Vernon my own!—of possessing in her all that could render life agreeable; I hastened home to my family and informed them of my approaching bliss, who all sympathized in the anticipated joy which swelled my bosom. ”

“ Melissa hastened to the mansion; as she reached the door a very brilliant flash of lightning, accompanied by a tremendous explosion, alarmed her. A thunder bolt had entered a large elm tree within the enclosure, and with a horrible crash, had shivered it from top to bottom. She unlocked the door and hurried to her chamber. Deep night now filled the atmosphere; the rain poured in torrents, the wind rocked the building, and bellowed in the adjacent groves: the sea raged and roared, fierce lightnings rent the heavens, alternately involving the world in the sheeted flame of its many coloured fires ”

“ Towards evening Melissa took her usual walk around the enclosure. It was that season of the year when weary summer is lapsing into the arms of fallow autumn.—The day had been warm, and the light gales bore revigorating coolness on their wings as they tremulously agitated the foliage of the western forest, or fluttered among the 107 branches of the trees surrounding the mansion. The green splendours of spring had begun to fade into a yellow lustre, the flowery verdure of the fields was changed to a russet hue. ”

“ That heavenly form, that discriminate mind—all lovely as light, all pure as a seraph’s—a prey to worms—mingled with incorporeal shadows, regardless of former inquietudes or delights, regardless of the keen anguish which now wrings tears of blood from my despairing heart!
“Eternal Disposer of events! if virtue be thy special care, why is the fairest flower in the garden of innocence and purity blasted like a noxious weed? Why is the bright gem of excellence trampled in the dust like a worthless pebble?—Why is Melissa hurried to the tomb?” ”

“ It was on a little eminence which sloped gradually to the lake, in the most pleasant part of the village. “Here, said Alonzo one day to Melissa, will we pass our days in all that felicity of mind which the chequered scenes of life admit. In the spring we will rove among the flowers. In summer, we will gather strawberries in yonder fields, or whortleberries from the adjacent shrubbery. The breezes of fragrant morning, and the sighs of the evening gale, will be mingled with the songs of the thousand various birds which frequent the surrounding groves. ”

“ She informed him that her father had that evening ordered her to prepare to become the wife of Beauman. He told her that her disobedience was no longer to be borne.—“No longer, said he, will I tamper with your perverseness: you are determined to be poor, wretched and contemptible. I will compel you to be rich, happy, and respected. You suffer the Jack-a-lantern fancy to lead you into swamps and quagmires, when, did you but follow the fair light of reason, it would conduct you to honour and real felicity. There are happiness and misery at your choice. ”

“ Melissa, the sister of Edgar, was about sixteen years of age. She was not what is esteemed a striking beauty, but her appearance was pleasingly interesting. Her figure was elegant; her aspect was attempered with a pensive mildness, which in her cheerful moments would light up into sprightliness and vivacity. Though on first impression, her countenance was marked by a sweet and thoughtful serenity, yet she eminently possessed the power to
“Call round her laughing eyes, in playful turns,
The glance that lightens, and the smile that burns.” ”

“ Spring, with its verdured fields, flowery meads, and vocal groves: its vernal gales, purling rills, and its evening whippoorwill: summer, with its embowering shades, reflected in the glassy lake, and the long, pensive, yet sprightly notes of the 253 solitary strawberry-bird;* its lightning and its thunder; autumn with its mellow fruit, its yellow foliage and decaying verdure; winter, with its hoarse, rough blasts, its icy beard and snowy mantle, all tended to thrill with sensations of pleasing transition, the feeling bosoms of Alonzo and Melissa. ”

“ My belief was, that Melissa would comply with her father’s will, especially after her prospects of connecting with you were cut off by the events which ruined your fortune. You, Alonzo, have yet, I find, to learn the character of women. It has been my particular study. Melissa, now ardently impassioned by first impressions, irritated by recent disappointment, her passions delicate and vivid, her affections animated and unmixed, it would be strange, if she could suddenly relinquish primitive attachments founded on such premises, without a struggle. ”

“ I shall ever pray for your felicity.—Our affections are not under our direction; our happiness depends on our obedience to their mandates. Whatever, then, may be my sufferings, you are unblameable and irreproachable.” He took his hat in extreme agitation, and prepared to take his leave.
Melissa had recovered in some degree from her embarrassment, and collected her scattered spirits. “Your conduct, Alonzo, said she, is generous and noble. Will you give yourself the trouble, and do me the honour to see me once more?” ”

“ Pursue thy grovelling schemes. Strive to force to your arms a lady who abhors you, and were it not on one account, must ever continue to despise and hate you.”
“Alonzo, replied Beauman, I perceive thou knowest me not. You and I were rivals in our pursuit—the hand of Melissa. Whether from freak or fortune, the preference was given to you, and I retired in silence. ”

“ On one side of the room appeared a hearse, on which some person was laid: he went up to it—the first object that arrested his attention was the lovely form of Melissa, shrouded in the sable vestments of death! Cold and lifeless, she lay stretched upon the hearse, beautiful even in dissolution; the dying smile of complacency had not yet deserted her cheek. The music of her voice had ceased; her fine eyes had closed for ever. Insensible to objects in which she once delighted ”

“ Innumerable stars glittered in the firmament, intermingling their quivering lustre with the pale splendours of the milky way.
Melissa did not retire from the window until late; she then shut it and withdrew within the room. She determined not to go to bed that night. If she was to be visited by beings, material or immaterial, she chose not again to encounter them in darkness, or to be surprised when she was 99 asleep. But why should she fear? She knew of no one she had injured. She knew of none she had displeased except her father, her aunt and Beauman. ”

“ Alonzo walked with her to the gate which opened into the yard surrounding her father’s house. It was dangerous for him to go farther. Should he be discovered with Melissa, even by a domestic of the family, it must increase the persecutions against her. They parted. Alonzo stood at the gate, 67 gazing anxiously after Melissa as she walked up the long winding avenue, bordered with the odour-flowing lilac, and lofty elm, her white robes now invisible, now dimly seen as she turned the angles of the walk, until they were totally obscured, mingling with the gloom and darkness of the night. ”

“ After stocking and paying for my farm, and purchasing the requisites for my business, I have got considerable money at my command: we live frugally, and realize the blessings of health, comfort, and contentment. Our only disquietude is on your account, Alonzo. Your affair with Melissa, I suppose, is not so favourable as you could wish. But despair not, my son; hope is the harbinger of fairer prospects: rely on Providence, which never deserts those who submissively bow to the justice of its dispensations.”
Unwilling to disturb the serenity of his parents, Alonzo did not tell them his troubles. ”

“ To the bosom, the dark bosom of the oblivious tomb! There lie all the graces worthy of love in life—all the virtues worthy of lamentation in death! There lies perfection; perfection has here been found. Was she not all that even Heaven could demand?—Fair, lovely, holy and virtuous. Her tender solicitudes, her enrapturing endearments, her soul-inspiring blandishments,—gone, gone for ever? ”

“ In pursuance of his design he went to his father’s. He found the old gentleman with his man contentedly tilling his farm, and his mother cheerfully attending to household affairs, as their narrow circumstances would not admit her to keep a maid without embarrassment. Alonzo’s soul sickened on comparing the present state of his family with its former affluence; but it was an unspeakable consolation to see his aged parents contented and happy in their humble situation; and though the idea could not pluck the thorn from his own bosom, yet it tended temporarily to assuage the anguish of the wound. ”

“ The flower beds were choaked with the low running bramble and tangling five-finger; tall, rank rushes, mullens and daisies, had usurped the empire of the kitchen garden. The viny arbour was broken, and principally gone to decay; yet the “lonely wild rose” blushed mournfully amidst the ruins. As she passed from the garden she involuntarily stopped at the cemetery: she paused in serious reflection:—“Here, said she, in this house of gloom rest, in undisturbed silence, my honourable ancestors, once the active tenants of yonder mansion. ”

“ Again he paused, but Alonzo was still silent. He proceeded—“Could you, Alonzo, suffer life, when you see the wife of your bosom, probably your infant children, pining in misery for want of bread? And what else have you to expect if you marry in your present situation? I know you have talents and have had an education. But what are they without means? You have friends and well wishers; but which of them will advance you four or five thousand pounds, as a gratuity? My daughter must be supported according to her rank and standing in life. ”

“ Money is the god to which he implicitly bows. The case is difficult, but not insurmountable. You must first see Melissa; she is now in the next room. I will introduce you in; converse with her, after which I will lay my plan before you.”
Alonzo entered the room; Melissa was sitting by a window which looked into a pleasant garden, and over verdant meadows whose tall grass waved to the evening breeze. Farther on, low vallies spread their umbrageous thickets, where the dusky shadows of night had begun to assemble. ”

“ If all the sympathies of the most ardent friendship had been drawn forth towards the former, must not the most 11 tender passions of the soul be attracted by the milder and more refined excellencies of the other?
Beauman had become the suitor of Melissa; but the distance of his residence rendered it inconvenient to visit her often. He came regularly, about once in two or three months; of course Alonzo and he sometimes met. Beauman had made no serious pretensions, but his particularity indicated something more than fashionable politeness. ”

“ As he jumped back over the garden wall, he found a man standing at its foot, very near him: after a moment’s scrutiny he perceived it to be Beauman. “What, my chevalier, said he to Alonzo, such an adept in the amorous science already? Hast thou then eluded the watchful eyes of Argus, and the vigilance of the dragon!”
“Unfeeling and impertinent intruder, retorted Alonzo, seizing hold of him; is it not enough that an innocent daughter must endure a merciless parent’s persecuting hand, but must thou add to her misery by thy disgusting interference!” ”

“ I cannot see you the dupe and slave of an artful and insidious woman, who does not sincerely return your love; nor can I bear to see your marriage consummated with one whose soul and affections are placed upon another object.”
“Here she hesitated—while I, with insufferable anguish of mind, begged her to proceed.
“About six or eight months after your departure, she continued, it was reported to Miss Vernon that she had a rival in the Indies; that you had there found an American beauty, on whom you lavished those endearments which belonged of right to her alone. ”

“ Beware, then, my son, beware of yielding the heart to the effeminacies of passion. Exquisite sensibilities are ever subject to exquisite inquietudes. Counsel with correct reason, place entire dependence on the Supreme, and the triumph of fortitude and resignation will be yours.”
Franklin paused. His reasonings, however they convinced the understanding, could not heal the wounds of Alonzo’s bosom.—In Melissa he looked for as much happiness as earth could afford, nor could he see any prospect in life which could repair the loss he had sustained. ”

“ The writer believes that generally he has copied nature. In the ardent prospects raised in youthful bosoms, the almost consummation of their wishes, their sudden and unexpected disappointment, the sorrows of separation, the joyous and unlooked for meeting—in the poignant feelings of Alonzo, when, at the grave of Melissa, he poured the feelings of his anguished soul over her miniature by the “moon’s pale ray;”——when Melissa, sinking on her knees before her father, was received to his bosom as a beloved daughter risen from the dead. ”

“ She immediately set about preparing tea and soon had it ready, and a comfortable repast was spread for his entertainment.—And now, reader, if thou art a child of nature, if thy bosom is susceptible of refined sensibility, contemplate for a moment, Melissa and Alonzo seated at the same table, a table prepared by her own hand, in a lonely mansion, separated from society, and no one present to interrupt them. ”