sider as objects of ridicule, but accompanied, as here, with deadly sin, of detestation.”

All this was true, but my heart was full of what had happened. It occupied me all night, and I longed for the early morning to bring another post, whatever intelligence might be brought along with it.

The morning came, and brought nothing; from which I knew not what to augur, and was only the more distressed from suspense. The next day announced that the hope for Lord Albany continued, but that the fear for Hastings was not diminished; on the contrary, that the torture sustained by the still vain endeavour to extract the ball, by producing fever, made every thing worse.

Bertha had implored to be allowed to attend her sinking brother, which, with an extremity of passion, shocking to every one, he had precipitately refused.

What a dreadful lesson of the mischiefs of selfindulged passion!

Unable to bear the cruel uncertainties arising from distance from the mournful scene, I at length obtained a reluctant consent from Fothergill to proceed to York.

"To be repulsed with anger or contempt, like his poor sister," said my tutor. "Have I not told you what a proud man is? And does not this shew more than any thing how proud he is? Go. Console him if you can, and try to make him think of Heaven's

bliss;' but depend upon it, though he die, he will ❝ make no sign."

399

I was shocked with this melancholy thought; yet

proceeded to York with I know not what plan for my conduct, only I thought I might relieve my o'erfraught heart if I could but see Hastings before he died, and receive from him the last embrace of friendship.

On my arrival I flew to the hotel where he lay, but was refused all access-not by him, who knew nothing of the visit, but by the surgeon whom I saw, and who told me there was not a hope of the case.

The senior Mr. Hastings, hearing I was there, occasioned me some distress by coming into the room where I was, for I dreaded his cold formality, perhaps now mixed with disdain and displeasure.

Ah! with what little reason did I accuse him! The high man of quality was now bowed to the earth with a woe to have been exempt from which he would have changed situations with me. For he had been bitterly convinced, by this visitation, that in the eye of Heaven he was no more than the lowest of his fellow-men, and that the proudest can have little cause for pride in a lot of misery common to all.

Man of quality as he was, he was now a man of sorrows, and the one seemed lost in the other. To my astonishment, therefore, after the expectation I had formed, he accosted me not merely with politeness, but soft complacency-nay, with tenderness; for his pride was scourged and his heart wrung; and when I told him I had always loved his son, so that I could not bear remaining so far from him, though I might not be able to do him any service, the old man's eyes filled with tears, and he grasped my hand with emotion when he said, " And yet, my good young man,

my poor son made but an ill return, I fear, for your attachment; but I trust you will forgive him, for he has dearly paid for that, and all his other deficiencies.”

He could go no further, and I was too affected to reply. He then made me sit down by him, but placing his finger on his lips, told me we must not talk, for Charles lay in the next room, and if there was a spark of hope, it could only be through the most absolute quiet. In fact, he had been only kept alive up to this time by laudanum.

Never before had I been so affected by another person's distress; for, though evidently acute, there was now a resignation and calm about Mr. Hastings that seemed to throw a dignity around his sorrow which only made it more impressive. At length he dismissed me, whispering me to come again, though despairing of my ever seeing his son alive.

It may be supposed that I thought of Bertha, but, for obvious reasons, I dared not mention her name; and so ended this first visit.

The second (the next day morning) was still more overwhelming, for the crisis approached, and called still more for exertion. One of the surgeons and Mr. Hastings had watched all night, to observe the least possible change for good or for bad; the former being absolutely necessary to enable them once more to attempt to extract the ball, upon which the only chance of life depended. There was no such change; and if there had been, probably it would have been without avail, for the sinking patient, when able to speak, only shewed himself so, by begging that no more attempts

might be made, and that he might be allowed to die in peace.

The weeping father, assured by the surgeon that he would sink at once under such an attempt, promised that he should suffer no more, and waited the event with a submission which engaged all my reverence. He stirred not from the bed-side, but, with the sufferer's hand in his, watched the parting spirit.

In this crisis a message of inquiry was delivered from Lord Albany, and Mr. Hastings with agony mentioned this, and Bertha's and my name, to him; but life was ebbing fast; nor was there strength left to ascertain whether he had any, or what feeling towards any of us, still less whether he thought "of heaven's bliss."

A momentary convulsion of doubtful import then seized his cheek, and he opened his eyes; but having fixed a vacant look upon his father, closed them again for ever!

The news of this, communicated to me by the surgeon at the door of the apartment, where I had passed two hours, changed the anxieties I had undergone into a stupor from which I was not easily recovered; and to my astonishment, when I awoke, I found myself on a couch in Mr. Hastings' sitting-room. He had retained all his self-possession; and on being informed my condition, had even come out to see me, and gave orders for my being attended. How differently may we judge of persons from their deserts!

of

After coming to myself I was conveyed to my inn, and saw him not again that day; but Mr. Sandford,

the surgeon, by his desire, came to see me in the evening. Recovered from the attack, and encouraged by Mr. Sandford's assiduity, I asked him as a favour to tell me any particulars he knew of poor Foljambe's demeanour or conversation during his sufferings, particularly as to any religious impressions he might have shewn; for I own Fothergill's presages had never quitted me, and they had shocked me so much, not more on Foljambe's account than on that of human nature at large, that I was anxious and hopeful that they should be disproved.

Sandford gave me no comfort; quite the contrary. When his father, whose whole conduct, he said, was admirable, intreated Foljambe to think of what might be impending, and ask and send forgiveness to his sister and Lord Albany, but still more to submit himself to, and ask pardon of heaven-all which he did with most pious earnestness-he could get no answer but a solemn demur to the proposal.

"What have I done," said he, "to be forgiven by Bertha and Albany, who ought rather to ask forgiveness of me? and as to heaven, thwarted as I have been in every thing in this world, what can I expect in the next? Do not torment me, father, but let me die in quiet."

I own this account overwhelmed me, and I thought with distress of Fothergill's prediction.

With regard to the other proud man (Lord Albany), on the strength of the message of inquiry sent by him to Foljambe, I had some hope of him, and asked Mr. Sandford whether any thing like contri