Wacousta: A Tale of the Pontiac Conspiracy--Volume 1

ore acutely painful by the wretched reflections, which, now that he had full leisure to review the past, and anticipate the future in all the gloom attached to both, so violently assailed him. Fro

ged. Yet, powerful as this hope was, it was unavoidably qualified by dispiriting doubt; for a nature affectionate and bland, as that of Charles de Haldimar, could not but harbour distrust, while a shadow of uncertainty, in regard to the fate of a brother so tenderly loved, remained. He had forced himself to believe as much as possible what he wished, and the eff

stricken plant, unresisting to the earth. But now that, in the calm and solitude of his chamber, he had leisure to review the fearful events conspiring to produce this extremity, his anguish of spirit was even deeper than when the first rude shock of conviction had flashed upon his understanding. A tide of suffering, that overpowered, without rendering him sensible of its positive and abstract character,

umbering twice his years. He had entered the army, as most young men of rank usually did at that period, rather for the agremens it held forth, than with any serious view to advancement in it as a profession. Still he entertained the praiseworthy desire of being something more than what is, among military men, emphatically termed a feather-bed soldier; and, contrary to the wishes of his fashionable mother, who would have preferred seeing him exhibit his uniform in the drawing-rooms of London, had purchased the step into his present corps from a cavalry regiment at home. Not that we mean, however, to assert he was not a feather-bed soldier in its more literal sense: no man that ever glittered in gold and scarlet was fonder of a feather-bed than the young baronet; and, in fact, his own observations, recorded in the early part of this volume, sufficiently prove his predilection for an indulgence which, we take it, in no w

nd discipline, why not place them under the direction of the adjutant or the officer of the day, whoever he might chance to be, and not unnecessarily disturb a body of gentlemen from their comfortable slumbers at that unconscionable hour?" Poor Sir Everard! this was the only grievance of which he complained, and he complained bitterly. Scarcely a morning passed without his inveighing loudly against the barbarity of such a custom; threatening at the same time, amid the laughter of his companions, to quit the service in disgust at what he called so ungentlemanly and gothic a habit. All he waited for, he protested, was to have an opportunity of bearing away the spoils of some Indian chief, that, on his return to England, he might afford his lady mother an opportunity of judging with her own eyes of the sort of enemy he had relinquished the comforts of home to contend against, and ex

he bore attestation to her gentleness and her goodness. The heart of Charles de Haldimar, soldier as he was, was pure, generous, and unsophisticated as that of the sister whom he so constantly eulogized; and, while listening to his eloquent praises, Sir Everard learnt to feel an interest in a being whom all had declared to be the counterpart of her brother, as well in personal attraction as in singleness of nature. With all his affected levity, and

so loth to destroy the identity of the semblance with its original, that we throw a veil over that reason which is then so little in unison with our wishes, and forgive much in consideration of the very mystery which first gave a direction to our interest, and subsequently chained our preference. How is it to be lamented, that illusions so dear, and images so fanciful, should find their level with time; or that intercourse with the world, which should be the means rather of promoting than marring human happiness, should leave on the heart so little vestige of those impressions which characterize the fervency of youth; and which, dispassionately considered, constitute the only true felicity of riper life! It is then that man, in all the vigour and capacity of his intellectual nature, feels the sentiment of love upon him in all its ennobling force. It is then that his impetuous feelings, untinged by the romance which imposes its check upon the more youthful, like the wild flow of the mighty torrent, seeks a channel wherein they may empty themselves; and were he to follow the guidance of those feelings, of which in that riper life he seems ashamed as of a weakness unwo

ter. It might have been curiosity in the first instance, or that mere repose of the fancy upon an object of its own creation, which was natural to a young man placed like himself for the moment out of the pale of all female society. It has been remarked, and justly, there is nothing so dangerous to the peace of the human heart as solitude. It is in solitude, our thoughts, taking their colouring from our feelings, invest themselves with the power of multiplying

s on this subject, we return for the present from a digression into which

ld awaken any unusual or extraordinary sentiment of preference. Much and fervently as he desired such an event, there was an innate sense of decorum, and it may be secret pride, that caused him to abstain from any observation having the remotest tendency to compromise the spotless delicacy of his adored sister; and such he would have considered any expression of his own hopes and wishes, where no declaration of preference had been previously made. There was another motive for this reserve on the part of the young officer. The baronet w

loving. In one of his letters to the latter, he had alluded to his friend in terms of so high and earnest panegyric, that Clara had acknowledged, in reply, she was prepared to find in the young baronet one whom she should regard

n this, and the loss of that brother, was little short of madness, and yet De Haldimar could think of nothing else; nor for a period could the loud booming of the cannon from the ramparts, every report of which shook his chamber to its very foundations, call off his attention from a subject which, while it pained, engrossed every faculty and absorbed every thought. At length, towards the close, he called faintly to the old

telligence which he trusted might remove the anxiety of his suffering master, again made his appearance, stating the corpse was already se

icer, in the eager accents of one who, with the fullest conviction on his mind, yet grasps at the faintest shadow

half my grey hairs to be able to do so; but it is, indeed, too truly the captain who has

ved to see this day." Then springing suddenly up in his bed.-"Morrison,

covering which had been spurned to its very foot,-"consider you are in a burning fever, and the

m the blood he had lost, and giddy from the excitement of his fee

y, and whom, although his master, he regarded with the affection he would have borne to his own child. As he had justly observed,

had shed. He had continued some time in this faint and apparently tranquil state, when confused sounds in the barrack-yard, followed by the raising of the heavy drawbridge, announced the return of the detachment. Again he started up in his bed and demanded

I am the bearer of good news. Your broth

of conflicting emotions. A moment afterwards, and he exclaimed re

ngs. If you would seek to lull me with false hopes, you are wrong. I am prepared to

mnly returned Ensign Sumners, deeply touched by the affliction he witnessed,

flush of previous excitement on the cheek of the sufferer. "Quick, Morrison, give me my clothes.-Where is

s much in the dark about his fate as ever. All that is certain is, we have no positive knowledge of his death; but

h of bitter recollections flashed on the memory of the young man, and the tears coursed each other rapidly down his cheek. His emotion lasted for a few moments, and he pursued,-"Poor Valletort himself saw him, for he was nearly as much overwhelmed with affliction as I was; and even Morrison beheld him also, not ten

his own; "for, in truth, there is a great deal of mystery attached to the whole affair. I have not seen the body myself; but I distinctly hear

redited. Erskine is mistaken-he must be mistaken-it can be no other than my poor brother Frederick. Sumners, I am sick, faint, wit

owards the door; "but believe me, De Haldimar, you may make yo

d De Haldimar, while an involun

ng to examine the body of the murdered man when I came here.-But here he is himself,

" exclaimed that officer, now rushing to the bedside of his friend, a

r; and then, overcome with joy, surprise, and gratitude, he a

ole body of officers, was aware of the close friendship that subsisted between the young men, and he felt, at

tears which seemed to afford so much relief to the overcharged heart of the sufferer. At length they passed gradually away; and a smile,

ey congratulated themselves on the futility of those fears, which, if realised, must have embittered every future moment of their lives with the most harrowing recollections. Sir Everard, particularly, felt,

beauty resembled that of a frail and delicate woman, rather than that of one called to the manly and arduous profession of a soldier. It was that delicate and Medor-like beauty which might have won the heart and fascinated the sense of a second Angelica. The light brown hair flowing in thick and natural waves over a high white forehead; the rich bloom of the transparent and downy cheek; the large, blue, long, dark-lashed eye, in which a shade o

y to an observation of De Haldimar's, alluding to the despair with which his sister would h

ruly absurd and romantic you will not credit it." He paused, hesitated, and then, as if determined to anticipate the ridicule he seemed to feel would be attached to his confession, with a forced half laugh pursued: "The fact is, Charles, I have been so much used to listen to your warm and eloquent praises of your sister

led high with pleasurable excitement, and raising himself up in his bed with one hand, while he grasped one

, and without whose presence I could not live. Valletort, that prize,-that treasure, that dearer half of myself, is yours,-yours for ever. I have long wished you should love, each other, and I felt, when you met, you would. If I have hitherto forborne from expressing this fondest wish of my heart, it has been from delicacy-from a natural fear of compromising the purity of my ador

h the enthusiasm of a young man of twenty, he painted to himself the entire fruition of those dreams

gently quitted the embrace of his friend: "who knows if her heart may not already throb for

the subject of one of my letters to Clara, who, in her turn, 'confesses a strong interest in one of whom she h

tand there are two or three handsome and accomplished fellows among the garrison of Michilima

heart of my sister. The dark eyed and elegant Baynton, and the musical and sonnetteering Middleton, to whom you, doubtless, allude, are

is doubly enhanced in your eyes, by the sincerity of the friends

n creation," returned his friend, impatiently; "I know

n prospects. If she but approve me, my whole life

or of the apartment; it was opened, an

ishment parade, Lieutenant Valletor

aldimar,-the dangers by which they were beset,-and the little present probability of a re-union with those who were most dear to them,-all these recollections now flashed across their minds wi