“Three months had flown on airy wing, and neither our interviews, or correspondence, had been discovered, which, through the medium of a bosom friend, we had mutually enjoyed; when, one morning, by mere chance, in conversation with the father of Cecilia, he learnt, that he meant to take immediately his passage in the first ship that sailed for ——, in Italy, where, having an extensive magazine that required his inspection, he had apprised his partner of his intention, and also that he meant to bring over his daughter with him as a companion to himself, and to improve her for one twelve-months in the language and musical science of that inimitable country.
“This intelligence, as my friend well knew, was instant annihilation to our hopes and happiness, to lose her beloved society for so tedious a period was distraction; and, when I reflected on the probability of an Italian lover superceding my humble pretension, the world had no longer any charms for me; this, Victor, I mused to madness, for I, like you, was young, was gay, was happy; the impregnate cloud of sorrow had never veiled the sunshine of my heart, and I dreamed but of bliss, nor knew it was a vision, till I grasped the airy shade that flitted from my touch.
“I sought Cecilia—we met: her beauteous eyes, suffused in sparkling tears, proclaimed the fact; mutual we wept: we swore eternal constancy. Alas! poor idle children of delusion, we little knew how inefficient were our weak resolves opposed to wealth and power; to have declared my sentiments to her inexorable father, would have made her a perpetual exile; again, I suggested assuming the habit of a domestic, sailing in the same vessel, and obtaining, on my arrival, a capacity in her father’s household; but there, again, the negative predominated; and, to be as brief possible in my relation, within ten days from the first intelligence of the voyage, I saw the vessel recede from shore, which contained my soul’s best treasure—yes, Victor, I kissed, I blessed her; and, on my bended knee, invoked the blessings of heaven for her safety and protection. She promised a regular correspondence by every post; and, compelled to be satisfied with this mutual alleviation of our sorrows, involved in all the agonies of love, we parted—never to meet again. I saw her faint upon the deck—I saw her borne in the rude arms of sailors to the cabin—but I saw no more: a temporary stupor seized my brain, and I found myself waked from a lethargic dream, and surrounded by officious strangers, one of whom calling a coach, conveyed me to my father’s house, where a violent illness ensued, which lasted many weeks, and caused me to explain to my parents the cause of my disorder. My mother, all meekness and gentleness, soothed my perturbed mind with the angelic balm of every comfort she could invent; but my father ridiculed my boyish folly, laughed me to scorn, and reprobated my daring presumption in fixing my ideas on an object so eminently my superior.”
I sighed from the bottom of my soul—my uncle paused—looked stedfastly in my face to perceive the effect of his narrative—shook his head—wiped an intruding tear of recollection, and thus continued:
“The lingering day rolled on in solemn sadness, and the only consolation I possessed, was in the valuable society and endearing communion of heart, that reciprocally passed between me and my ever lamented friend Victor Montalbert: ’twas to him, my noble boy, I consecrated your name, and may you ever be like him in benevolence, friendship, and virtue; for his soul was the mansion of honour, and his heart the realm of fidelity; but fate snatched him, like every other blessing, from my embrace; and in his loss I never risked a substitute: one sincere friend is all a man can ever dare expect; his loss was another dagger to my soul, but I had yet an embryo grief in store.
“I had received only four faithful and affectionate letters from my lovely exile, when, lo! the next packet from Italy brought me a letter from the pen, the direful pen, of her exasperated father, informing me he had discovered my audacious correspondence with his daughter, by means of an Italian servant, on whose probity Cecilia had confided, and dared me ever to address another to his daughter on peril of immediate punishment to both parties; and concluded by asserting, he had engaged her hand, not to a pitiful pennyless puppy, but a man of honour and fortune suitable to her own rank in life, which nuptials he should instantly enforce her obedience to celebrate.
“Distracted by this unexpected stroke of misfortune, I again relapsed into a paroxysm of despair. No letter arrived from Cecilia, by which I concluded she was deprived of every resource of future correspondence, well knowing the austere tyrant she had to deal with.
“Six months elapsed in the torments of cruel suspense, when one day I met, by chance, the identical captain of the vessel in which Cecilia left England; of him I enquired intelligence of the Delmond family—but what words can express my horror and astonishment, when I learned that my beloved Cecilia had been inhumanly sacrificed by her barbarian parent, in a compulsatory marriage with an opulent merchant residing at Florence, whose name was Lausanne. Thus ended my hopes and happiness; for in vain my friends diverted my mind—in vain their helpless pity soothed my grief, or roused my energies: all, all, were dormant; and, though I was lead in the unceasing round of common-place amusements, though I was introduced to the most accomplished and lovely women, not one had power to extract a smile, or warm this icy heart, for I had sworn I had abjured all women; and from that hour my character and manner grew so misanthropical, that even time, that leveller of good and evil, will ne’er irradicate the poisonous root that still entwines the fibres of my heart; and so perfectly have I cherished her image in my remembrance, that every feature of Cecilia Delmond burst like a beam of sunshine on my soul, when first that angelic girl, that Rosa Fitzclarence, met my eye. Do you now wonder, Victor, at my agitation? can you pity an old man’s sorrows, and not indicate feelings that ought perhaps to be extinct, after being a pupil in the school of experience to the present age.”
He ceased; and, as he reclined back in his chair, I caught his hand. “My dear, my revered uncle,” exclaimed I, “I never till this moment knew the virtues of your heart—Why, ah! why have you concealed from the world those principles which so justly ennoble the human heart; was love a crime on your part! No, ’twas the voluntary effusions of a soul replete with virtue, and crowned with honour, that bowed in silent submission to the decree of fate.—Alas! good sir, while contemplating your sorrows of the heart, how much may I one day experience of my own; ah! should my destiny be consonant with your’s, where shall I find an antidote?”
“Victor,” resumed my uncle, “heaven avert it—why look so serious? why speak with so much energy, my boy?”
“Oh, sir,” replied I, “I cannot explain; make but Rosa Fitzclarence, Cecilia Delmond, and search no farther the lacerated heart of St. Alban: your own feelings must tell you what mine are at this moment, equally, alas! hopeless as sincere.”
“My uncle started forward on his seat, “hopeless,” ejaculated he,“Oh! heaven forbid; if my most sanguine wishes and endeavours can constitute your felicity: but crush, I conjure crush, the impetuous flame, nor let false hope, in cob-web guise, flit her visionary form before your love-filmed eye to lead you to destruction. Rosa Fitzclarence is an orphan heiress, in which case she is left in the power of her guardians till she becomes of age, which I understand a few months will complete; should the sentiments of those guardians be rigidly enforced, contrary to the inclination and future happiness of their ward, it’s more than probable she will adopt the system her own good judgment impels, and give her hand where love and prudence best direct it, for she has no stern father to oppose her happiness like her dear hapless polygraph: but be very cautious how you proceed—you have won my heart by your candour, and it shall not go unrewarded.”
He wept like an infant; I forced a glass of Madeira through his trembling lips—nature wanted its revival.
“One word more,” continued he, “do not, I conjure you, drop the slightest hint of your prepossession to Dr. Tonic; the mischief-making imp would be a living chronicle of vexation: and, if a shade could cross your interest, in his own behalf, depend upon it you would rue the result of such communication.”
I promised peculiar attention to his desire. “But, sir,” observed I, “e’er the subject drops, did you never receive any further intelligence of the fate, fortune, or family, of Madame Lausanne?”
“I learnt,” replied my uncle, “that she sunk into a state of apathy almost immediately after her marriage, in which she ever expressed herself extremely unhappy, and great doubts were entertained of her life, for several years after, from the delicacy and impaired state of her constitution, subjoined to the morose behaviour of her husband, villain as he was; but thank heaven she was relieved from her persecution five years after her marriage by the death of her hymenial tyrant, soon after she had given birth to a daughter, a circumstance wholly unexpected, after so long a series of indisposition acting on a frame of such delicate texture, and I have been informed she quitted Florence immediately, retired to the recluse shades of Italy, where she soon after died a martyr to a broken heart, but whether her child is yet living, I know not.”