Chapter XII: Part 12

Chirsty assured her uncle that nothing should be wanting on her part towards her aunt; and she kept her word, for, neglecting all other things, she devoted herself entirely to the task of pleasing her. For some little while her pious endeavours seemed to have succeeded; but it happened that Chirsty, unambitious as she was to shine, so far eclipsed her aunt in every attraction that makes woman charming, that without intending it, or rather whilst intending the very reverse, she monopolised all the attention of those with whom they associated either at home or abroad. Compared to her Mrs. Ross was treated like a piece of furniture,--any table or cabinet in the room had more attention paid to it. She could not shut her eyes to her own inferiority, and envy, hatred, and malice took full possession of her. Chirsty's efforts to please, though they had ceased to be successful, were still unremitting; but her uninterrupted gentleness was met by perpetual peevishness and ill humour, always excepting such times as her uncle chanced to be present, when the lady's words and manner were ever bland, kind, and false. With such devilish tempers it often happens that the more they torture the more they hate, and so it was that the dislike of this woman towards her niece rapidly grew to so great a height, that she resolved to get her removed from the house.

Fondly believing that she had a stronger hold over her husband's affections than she really possessed, she first of all attempted to undermine her in her uncle's good opinion by sly insinuations against her truth, her temper, and what she called the girl's pretended love for him, which she declared was in reality no greater than her attention to her own self-interest required. But finding that this line of attack only excited his anger, she with great art gradually withdrew from it, and by slow degrees she began to confess that she now believed she had been altogether mistaken in her estimation of Chirsty, and every succeeding day heard her bestow more and more praise on her temper and disposition. This was a language that was much more congenial to the nabob, but he was not altogether the dupe of it. He however listened with seeming attention to his wife when she prosed on about the zeal she felt for her niece's interest, as well as when, after a long prologue, she finally proposed the grand scheme of sending Chirsty out to India to the care of a particular friend of the nabob's at Calcutta, that she might there make some wealthy match, so as to secure her a magnificent independence for life. Plainly as Mr. Ross saw through the motives that dictated all this apparent solicitude, he took care to appear to think it quite genuine. Nor did he refuse to entertain the project; for as he began shrewdly to suspect that his niece could now have but little happiness under the same roof with his wife, he resolved at least to put it in Chirsty's power to accept or reject this proposal. He accordingly sought for a private interview with her, and then it was that her tears, and her half confessions with difficulty extracted, satisfied him of the correctness of his suspicions, and the readiness with which she acceded to the plan which he laid before her at once determined him as to the propriety of going immediately into it. He therefore lost not a moment in securing everything that might contribute to her comfort and happiness during the voyage, and he presented her with a letter of credit for a sum of money amply sufficient to put her above all anxiety as to that matter on reaching the shores of the Ganges.

These substantial marks of her uncle's affection towards her, supported as they were by a thousand little nameless kindnesses, did not tend to allay the grief which she felt at parting with him. The reflection that she went because she felt convinced that her uncle's future domestic comfort required her absence, was all that she had to give her courage to bear it, and she was so much absorbed in this conviction, that she hardly gave much thought to the consideration of what her own future fate might be.

The gallant ship had gone merrily on its voyage for several days before Chirsty began to mix at all with her fellow-passengers. But when she first came upon deck, it was like the appearance of the morning sun over the eastern horizon of some country where he is worshipped. All eyes were instantly bent upon her; and ere the people had been familiarised to her beauty, the elegance of her manners, and the charms of her conversation, soon made her the great centre of attraction to all who walked the quarter-deck. Above all others, she seemed to have made a deep and powerful impression on the commander, whom I shall call Captain Mordaunt, a very elegant and agreeable man, of superior intellect and information. He soon showed himself indefatigable in his attentions to her. His command of the ship gave him a thousand opportunities of manifesting a marked degree of politeness towards her, by doing her many little courteous services which no one else had the power to perform. He easily invented means of keeping all other aspirants to her favour at a sufficient distance from her. Her heart was as yet her own; and as Mordaunt never lost any opportunity of engaging her in conversation, and as his talk was always well worth listening to, it was no wonder that so many unequivocal proofs of an attachment on the part of so handsome a man, in the prime of life, and of address so superior, should have soon prepared the way for her favourable reception of his declared passion; and this having once been made, and mutually acknowledged, it seemed to grow in warmth as the days fled merrily away, and as the progress of the prosperous bark carried them nearer and nearer to that sun which gives life and heat to all animated nature. Often did Mordaunt gladden the artless mind of Chirsty Ross as they sat apart together on the poop of the vessel, towards the conclusion of their voyage, in the full enjoyment of the fanning sea-breeze, by the enchanting pictures which he painted of the happiness of their future wedded life.

"I have already realised a tolerable fortune," said he, one evening carelessly, "so that by the time I return to Calcutta from my trip to China, whither you know the vessel is bound, I may safely claim your hand, in order that we may sail home together as man and wife. You can have no dread of spending our honeymoon on the wide waters, my love, since they have yielded us so happy a courtship, especially when you think that we shall be on our way to some sweet rural residence in England, where we shall be insured the enjoyment of tranquillity and happiness for the rest of our days. And there, with what I have saved, added to the liberal allowance which your rich uncle will give you during his life, and with the certainty which you have of succeeding to his immense fortune at his death, we shall be able to live in a style altogether worthy of that exquisite beauty, and that angelic soul, with which Heaven has blessed you, and of those fascinating manners and brilliant accomplishments, which are calculated to make you the queen of any society you may be pleased to grace with your presence."

"Stay, stay, Mordaunt!" replied Chirsty, smiling playfully. "You are running too fast before the wind. I need not tell you what you have so often told me, that I am prepared to be thine on the wide ocean, in the populous city, or in the lonely desert, in sickness or in health, in wealth or in poverty! And well is it, indeed, that you have so often vowed all this much to me, for I must needs disabuse your mind of some part of its visions of riches, so far at least as that share may have reached which your fancy has ascribed to me. I have neither claims nor expectations from my uncle, who has already done more for me than any niece in my circumstances had a right to expect."

"Haul taut that weather main-brace!" cried the captain, suddenly starting from her side; and although there appeared to be little change in the wind or the weather to warrant such activity, he became from that moment too much occupied in the care of the ship for any further conversation with Chirsty that evening.

In the morning the lovers met as usual, and then, as well as during the few remaining days of the voyage, Mordaunt was as full of affection and endearment to her as ever. Their last private interview took place ere she left the ship to go into the small craft that was to take her up the river, and then all their mutual vows were solemnly repeated. An understanding took place between them, that their engagement should be kept private, unless circumstances should arise which might render a disclosure necessary. Poor Chirsty gave way to all the poignancy of that grief which she felt at being thus obliged to part, even for a few months, from him to whom, in the then orphan state of her soul, she had given up the whole strength of her undivided affections. But hard as she found the effort to be, she was obliged to dry up her tears, and even to throw a faint and fleeting smile over her countenance as she left the ship, that she might not betray her own secret before indifferent persons; and it was only that warm and cherishing hope that lay nearest to her heart that kept the pulses of her life playing, and that enabled her to go through the trying scene of parting coolly with her lover, after he had deposited her under the roof of her uncle's friend, where they bid each other such a polite adieu as might have befitted two well-bred people who were separating with mutual esteem for one another, and who were, at the same time, very little solicitous as to whether there did or did not exist any future chance of their ever meeting again.

Mr. Gardner, as I shall call the gentleman to whose protection the nabob had consigned Chirsty, well deserved the confidence which had been placed in him. He spoke warmly of the many obligations under which he lay to Mr. Ross, and he declared himself to be delighted in having the opportunity which had thus been afforded him of proving his gratitude for those obligations. His lady entered deeply into all her husband's feelings, and both of them zealously occupied themselves in doing all in their power to promote the young lady's comfort and happiness. Numerous and brilliant were the parties which they made for the purpose of introducing their lovely protegé with sufficient eclat to the society of Calcutta. But not even the novelty and grandeur of Eastern magnificence, though produced for her with all its splendour, had any effect in removing that pensive air which their young friend wore when she landed, and which she continued to wear notwithstanding all the smiling new faces to which she was every moment introduced. One very natural result, however, was soon produced by these numerous public appearances which the kindness of her friends obliged her to make. She was immediately encircled by crowds of admirers; and before she had been many months in the country she had been put to the unpleasant necessity of declining proposals of marriage from numerous military men and civilians of rank so high as to make those with whom she lived wonder at the indifference she displayed. The more she was courted the more retiring she appeared to become.

Among the few who were admitted to a somewhat more familiar intercourse with Chirsty, was a Scottish gentleman of good family, whom I shall call Charles Græme. Though young, he had risen to a high civil situation, and he had already realised a very handsome fortune. He was a gentleman of enlarged mind and extremely liberal education; and as he was of manners much more retiring than most of those with whom she had become acquainted, she the more readily yielded to that intimacy which his greater friendship with her host and hostess gave him very frequent opportunities of forming with her. Like herself he was full of accomplishments; yet such was his modesty, that she had known him for a considerable time before accident led her to discover them. His mind was richly stored with the treasures of European literature; yet it was only on particular occasions that he allowed himself to give forth the sweets he had hoarded up, or to indulge in those critical remarks to which every one was prepared to listen with delight. As he became better known to her, and more at his ease with her, she discovered that his tastes, his acquirements, his sentiments, nay, his very soul, were all so much in harmony with her own, that she soon began to prefer his society to that of any other gentleman who approached her. Had her heart been unengaged, she might perhaps have had some degree of palpitation in its pulses, as she sensibly felt their friendship becoming every day more and more familiar; but, as the partridge believes that when its head is in the bush the whole of its body is secure, so she, knowing her own safety, owing to that secret cause which bound her to another, never dreamed that the accomplished Scotchman could be in any danger of feeling for her any sentiment one degree warmer than that of esteem. Thus it was, that with perfect unconsciousness on her part of the havoc she was working in his heart, she read with him, criticised with him, played with him, sang with him, or sketched with him, as the fancy of the moment might dictate, her heart being all the while filled with gratitude to him for so good-naturedly enabling her to pass, with at least some degree of rational enjoyment, some of those tedious hours that must yet elapse ere the return of him to whom she had pledged her virgin affections.

As for Charles Græme, he soon began to find that he existed only when his soul was animated by her bright eyes and her seraphic voice. When absent from their influence he felt like a walking mass of frozen clay. Her society became more necessary to him than food or air. He almost lived at the house of the Gardners, who, on their part, gave him every encouragement, being secretly pleased at what they believed to be the mutual attachment that was so rapidly growing, as they thought, between two individuals whom they had reason to love so much, and whom they knew to be so worthy of each other, and so well calculated to make each other happy for life. Day after day the infatuated young man drank deeper and deeper draughts of the sweet intoxication of love. At last the hour of wretchedness came. Seizing what he fondly believed to be a favourable moment, and with a bosom full of bounding hopes, he laid open the state of his heart to the idol of his soul. The scales fell, as if by magic, from her mental vision.

"What have I done, Mr. Græme," she cried, whilst her cheeks were suffused with blushes, and her whole frame trembled. "I have been blind! I have been thoughtless, most culpably thoughtless. Forgive me! oh, forgive me! but I cannot, I dare not, love you! I am already the pledged bride of another."

It would be vain for me to attempt to describe the kind of temporary death that fell upon her unfortunate lover as she uttered these terrible words, which, like the simoom of the desert, left no atom of hope behind them. Sinking into a chair, he uttered no sound, and he sat for some time quite unconscious even of those attentions which her compassion for him at the moment led her unscrupulously to administer to him. The friendship and the high respect which she entertained for him, as well as a regard for her own justification in his eyes, forbade her to allow him to leave her without a full explanation. It was given to him under the seal of secrecy, and the interview terminated with an agony of feeling and floods of tears upon his part, in which her compassion for that affliction which she had so innocently occasioned him compelled her, in spite of herself, to participate.

The young Scotchman tried for some time after this, to frequent the house where she lived as he had done previously. But her smiles fell upon him like sunshine upon a spectre. Reason and prudence at last came to his aid; and seeing that his heart could never hope for ease whilst he remained within reach of her attractions, he, to the great astonishment and disappointment of his friends, made use of the powerful interest which he possessed to procure another situation in a distant station, and he tore himself away from Calcutta.

And now came the time of misery to poor Chirsty herself, the season of hope deferred, of nervous impatience, and of sad forebodings. The period for which her fond heart panted in secret arrived--it passed away. Days, nay, weeks and months beyond it elapsed; and yet no tidings came of the gallant vessel that bore her betrothed husband. Delicately alive to the apprehension of betraying her secret by inquiry, she did not dare to ask questions. Fears, agonising fears, began to possess her, that some fatal calamity had befallen the ship, till, happening accidentally one day to cast her eyes over an old shipping list, she read, and her sight grew dim as she read, of its arrival from China, and its subsequent departure for England! How indestructible is hope! Even then she imagined it possible that all this might have been the result of accident, or might have arisen from the orders of superiors. But still her anxiety preyed terribly upon her mind, whilst she now looked forward to the new period of the ship's return from England. In vain did she try to occupy herself in her former pursuits. In vain did her friends endeavour to interest her with the amusements they provided for her. All were equally fruitless in their efforts; and the only explanation which the Gardners could find for her mysterious abstraction, was in the belief that the remembrance of Charles Græme was not altogether indifferent to her; and thence they cherished the hope that the matter between that young man and her might yet one day end as they wished it to do.

Months rolled on as if the days of which they were composed had been years, till Chirsty was one evening, with some difficulty, induced by her friends to go to a great public entertainment. She entered the room, leaning on Mrs. Gardner's arm; and they were on their way to find a seat at the upper end of it, when her eyes suddenly beheld him for whose return she had been so long vainly sighing. Her heart beat as if it would have burst from its seat in her bosom. She clung unconsciously with a firmer hold to the arm of her friend, and her limbs tottered under her with nervous joy as she moved forward. He was advancing slowly with a lady; and as he drew near, she held out her hand to him with a smile of happy and welcome recognition. He started at sight of her; and then, after scanning every feature of her countenance with calm indifference, he bowed coldly, turned aside, and moved away. Chirsty uttered a faint cry, swooned away, and was carried home by her friends in a state of insensibility, leaving the whole room in confusion.

Sufficient natural and ordinary reasons were very easily found by a company in such a climate as that of India for such an accident. But Mrs. Gardner had seen enough to convince her that some deeper and more powerful cause had operated upon Chirsty, than the mere heat of weather or the crowded state of a room; and after she had successfully used the necessary means for recovering her from her fainting fit, she insisted on being allowed to share confidentially in the secret of her afflictions. Chirsty felt some slight relief in telling her all; and strange it was that she still clung most unaccountably to hope. He might not have recognised her at first. He would yet appear. But Mrs. Gardner's common sense told her there was no hope; and she judged that it would be far better that Chirsty should receive conviction, however cruel that conviction might be, rather than remain in an anxiety which was so agonising and destructive. A very little time enabled Mrs. Gardner to collect all the particulars of his treachery. To sum up all in one word, he had arrived at Calcutta from England with a rich wife, with whom he had already sailed on his last voyage home.

This overwhelming intelligence was too much for the shattered frame of poor Chirsty Ross. She was attacked by a most alarming fever, which finally produced delirium; and even after the physicians had been able to master the bodily disease, the mental derangement continued so long, unabated, that her friends the Gardners considered it proper to write home to inform her uncle of her unhappy state.

It pleased God, however, to restore her at length to her right mind; and then it was that she was seized with an unconquerable desire of returning to England. The most that the Gardners could prevail upon her to agree to, was to delay her voyage to a period so far distant as might insure that fresh letters should reach her uncle, to inform him of her perfect mental recovery, and to teach him to look for her arrival by a certain ship they named; and after impatiently waiting till the time destined for her departure arrived, she bade her kind friends the Gardners an affectionate farewell, and sailed with a fair wind for Britain.

Who was it that arrived a week afterwards at the house of Mr. and Mrs. Gardner in the middle of the night, having come by Dawk from a far distant province? It was the shadow of Charles Græme!

"Thank God! thank God!" cried he energetically, after being told of her recovery, and at the same time bursting into a flood of tears, which weakness and fatigue left him no power to restrain. "Thank God for her restoration! But oh! that I had reached Calcutta but eight days sooner!"

He took his determination, applied for leave, to which the state of his health might of itself well enough have entitled him, and went for England by the very first fleet that sailed.

Chirsty Ross had a prosperous, but not a happy voyage. Her bodily health improved every day that she was at sea; but her thoughts having full time to brood over her miseries, her spirits became more and more sunk. She rallied a little when she beheld the English shore; and when she arrived in the river, her heart began to beat with affectionate joy at the prospect of again embracing her dear uncle. Even the image of her aunt had had its asperities softened down by length of time and absence; and she almost felt something resembling pleasure at the prospect of seeing her again. As the vessel arrived in the evening at her moorings, a boat came alongside, and a voice was heard to demand if there was a Miss Ross on board? Readily did Chirsty answer to the inquiry; and being told that it was her uncle's servant come to take her home, she lost not a moment in desiring her black maid to hand up a small box, containing a few things to be put into the boat; and leaving the girl to follow next day with her heavy baggage, she quickly descended the ladder. She was immediately accosted by a stout, vulgar-looking man out of livery, who announced himself to her as Mr. Ross's servant, and informed her that a carriage waited for her near the landing-place. She did accordingly find a post-chaise there; but when the door of it was opened, and the steps were let down, she started back on perceiving that there was a man seated at the farther side of it.

"Only a friend of Mr. Ross, ma'am, whom he has sent to attend you home," said the fellow who held the handle of the carriage-door.

Surprised as she was at the vulgarity of the dress and appearance of the gentleman who was inside, and still more at his want of politeness in not coming out of the carriage to hand her into it, her heart was too full of home at the moment to admit of her inquiring very particularly into circumstances, and accordingly, without more ado, she entered the vehicle. But whilst she was yet only in the act of seating herself, the fellow who had passed himself as her uncle's servant, sprang in after her, pulled up the steps, shut the door, the side blinds were drawn up, and the post-chaise was instantly flying at the rate of twelve or fourteen miles an hour. She screamed aloud, but the ruffian hands of both the villains were immediately on her mouth and silence was inculcated with the most horrible and blasphemous menaces.

"We must have none of your Indian fury here, mistress," said one of the fellows. "Behave peaceably and quietly, and you shall be treated gently enough, but if you offer to rave and riot, the whip, the gag, and the strait-waistcoat shall be your portion."

"Merciful Providence!" said Chirsty Ross, "why am I thus treated, and whither would you carry me?"

"As to your treatment, young lady," said the man, "methinks you have no right to complain of that as yet; and as to the why, I should be as mad as yourself were I to hold any talk with you about that; and, then, as to the whither, you have been already told that you are going to your uncle's residence."

"Mad!" exclaimed Chirsty, with a shudder that ran through her whole frame. "But, ah! I see how it is. Mr. Gardner's letters have been received by my uncle, and not those which I wrote to him sometime afterwards. And yet how did he know to expect me in England, and by this particular ship, too, if my letters have not yet reached him? It is very puzzling--very perplexing--very distressing; but since I am going to him, I may thank God that all will soon be put to rights."

"Aye, aye," said both the men at once, whilst they laughed rudely to one another, "all will soon be put to rights, I'll warrant me."

Chirsty sat silently dreaming over this strange and most vexatious occurrence, yet hoping that her misery would be but of short duration, till the chaise suddenly stopped, when one of the men let down the window, and called to the postilion to ring the great bell at a gate, which he had no sooner done than the peal was answered by the fierce barking of a watch-dog.

"What place is this?" cried Chirsty, with new-born alarm. "This is not the house of my Uncle Ross."

"You will see that all in good time, ma'am," replied one of the men. "Postboy, ring again. What are they all about, I wonder?"

At this second summons the huge nail-studded leaves of the ponderous oak and iron-bound gate were slowly rolled back, and the chaise was admitted into a large paved court, where the lights that were borne by one or two men of similar appearance to those who accompanied her, showed the plain front of a pretty considerable brick building, the narrow windows of which were strongly barred with iron. The door, too, was of the most massive strength, and the whole character of the edifice would of itself have conveyed to her the heart-sinking conviction that she was within the precincts of a mad-house, even if those strange sounds of uncouth laughter, wild rage, and wailing despair that came from various parts of the interior, had been altogether unheard by her. Rapidly did her thoughts traverse her mind. The first natural impulse that possessed her was a desire to scream out for help. But Chirsty was not destitute of resolution and self-command; and as she immediately reflected that nothing but the calmest behaviour could afford her any chance of convincing the people of such an establishment that she in reality was sane, she at once resolved to restrain herself from everything that might look like excitement.

"Where is Sarah?" cried one of the men as he assisted Chirsty out of the vehicle. "Aye, aye, here she comes. Here is your charge, Sall."

"A tall, handsome young woman," said Sarah, surveying Chirsty from head to foot, whilst she herself exhibited a person in every respect the reverse of that which she was admiring, being almost a dwarf, though with a body thickly and strongly built. Her head was large, with harsh prominent features, and her legs were bowed, and her arms long and uncouth looking. Round her waist, if waist that might be called where waist there was none, there was fastened a leathern belt, to which was appended a large bunch of great keys. In the eyes of Chirsty she was altogether a most formidable looking object.

"A tall handsome young woman," said she. "In what sort of temper is she, I wonder?"

"She was a little bit riotous at first," said one of the men, "but she has been quiet enough ever since."

"Come this way, young lady," said Sarah to Chirsty, in a rough tone and sharp voice, and at the same time she stretched out her long arm, and grasped her wrist with her bony fingers, whilst with the other hand she held up an iron lamp, the light of which she threw before her.

"Treat me not harshly," said Chirsty gently. "I am ready to obey you. I am quite aware that, from the strange mistake that has occurred, it would be vain for me to attempt to convince you at present of my sanity. I must patiently submit, therefore, to whatever restraint you may impose on me, until my uncle comes to see me, and convince himself. But do not, I pray you, exercise any unnecessary severity."

"No, no, poor thing," replied Sarah. "No, no; no severity, that is not quite necessary, I promise you. As to your uncle--ha! ha! ha!--no doubt you may chance to see un ere you leave this. Come this way."

Whilst this dialogue was passing, Chirsty was led by her strange conductress through some long passages, in which were several rectangular turnings, past many strongly secured doors, from within which issued strange discordant sounds of human misery, mingled with the clanking of chains; and up one or two flights of stairs, which induced her to believe that the apartment to which she was about to be introduced was in the upper story, and in a wing of the building. The door was like those she had seen in her way thither, of immense strength, and it was secured by a powerful lock, a couple of heavy bolts, and a huge chain and padlock. It was the last door of the narrow passage, which terminated about a yard beyond it in a dead wall. The little woman pushed Chirsty past it into the cul-de-sac which the passage thus formed, and then quitting her arm, she planted the fixed gaze of her formidable eye upon her, and placing the lamp on the ground, she selected the necessary keys, and using both hands she exerted her strength to undo the lock and padlock, and then drawing the bolts and removing the chain, she opened the den within. Beckoning to her charge with an air of command not to be misunderstood, she pushed Chirsty into the place, and then standing in the aperture of the half-closed door for a minute or more, with her right hand on the key, she threw in the light of the lamp so as fully to show the whole interior. It was indeed a wretched place. A low narrow bedstead, with bedclothes of the coarsest and meanest description, was the whole of its furniture, and that occupied more than a fourth part of the space contained within its four brick and stone walls. The floor was of flags,--it had no fireplace, and one small narrow iron-grated window was all the visible perforation that could admit light or air.

"May I not be allowed to have the few things which came in my travelling-box?" said Chirsty mildly, after having seated herself on the side of the bed.

"We shall consider of that, young lady," said Sarah sternly. "But in the meanwhile, to satisfy my mind that you may be safely left for a little time, you must suffer me to put those lily-white hands of yours into this glove," and setting the lamp on the floor, she drew from her ample pocket a leathern bag, into which Chirsty patiently submitted to have both her hands thrust together, after which they were secured by a strap in such a manner as to leave them entirely useless.

"Let me see now that you have got nothing dangerous about you," said Sarah; and after searching her all over, and removing from her a pocket-book containing such small instruments as women generally use, together with one or two other articles, and not forgetting her purse, which she secreted carefully in her own bosom, she added, "I shall be back with you in the twinkling of an eye, for you must have food ere you go to rest; meanwhile, the quieter you are the better it will be for you," and with these words she lifted the lamp and retired with it, locking and bolting the door with the utmost care.

It is needless for me to speculate as to what were Chirsty's thoughts, left as she was in the dark, as she listened to the retreating steps of her keeper until a stillness reigned around her that was only interrupted at times by the distant baying of the watch-dog in the court-yard, or by some of those melancholy demonstrations of madness that came every now and then upon her ear, of different degrees of intensity, as they chanced to be modified by circumstances. Notwithstanding all the resolution which she had summoned to her support, she shuddered to think of the vexatious confinement to which she might be exposed ere her fond uncle might be able to gather courage enough to come to visit her in the melancholy state of mind in which he probably believed her to be. Whilst she was ruminating on such matters, she heard the returning footsteps of Sarah.

"Here is some food for you," said her keeper, after opening the door and entering cautiously, "and, see, I have brought your night-clothes. I promised to use no needless severity; and if you continue to behave, you shall have no reason to complain of me. Let me help you to eat your supper, for this night you must be contented with simple bread and milk." And the first meal that poor Chirsty eat after returning to her native Britain, was doled out to her by spoonfuls from a porringer by the long fingers of her dwarfish keeper, who after making down her bed, assisted her into it, and then left her for the night.

And a strange night it was to her. Fatigue brought sleep upon her it is true, but there was no refreshment in it, for it was full of wild visions, and she started from time to time, and awaked to have her mind brought back to the full conviction of her distressing situation by the maniac laughter or howlings that broke at intervals upon the stillness around her. The only support she had in circumstances so trying was derived from religious meditations and aspirations, together with the hope which never forsook her, that her affectionate uncle might next day visit and relieve her.

FRESH LIGHT UPON THE SUBJECT.

Grant.--Stop for one moment, Clifford, till we ring for fresh candles, or we shall be in darkness before you have uttered five sentences more.

Dominie.--Stay, sir, I'll run to the kitchen for them myself. Preserve me! the less time we keep Mr. Clifford's poor lassie in such misery the better.

Mr. Macpherson soon returned with the new lights, set them down on the table, and drawing in his chair, put his elbows upon his knees, placed his cheeks firmly in the palms of his hands, and sat with his eyes eagerly fixed upon Clifford's countenance, with the most ludicrous expression of earnestness. Clifford resumed as follows.

LEGEND OF CHIRSTY ROSS--Continued.

The morning's dawn brought back the returning footstep of Sarah. She brought with her Chirsty's travelling-box with most of the things it contained.

"See," said she, as she set down the box, "I have kept my word. So long as you behave, you shall find me disposed to treat you well. I know that you have been quiet all night, and, therefore, we shall try you for to-day with your hands unmuffled. But mind!" added the old woman with a fearful expression of eye, "if you should change for the worse, there are worse punishments for you than this leathern glove."

"I thank you," said Chirsty meekly; "I think you will have no occasion to resort to any such. I hope my uncle will be here to-day, and that a few moments of conversation with him will satisfy him that you may be released from any further trouble with me."

"Your uncle!" cried Sarah, with an uncouth laugh. "But we shall see. Meanwhile, here comes water for you, and, by and by, you shall have breakfast."

A little black-looking sharp-eyed girl now entered with a pitcher, basins, and towels. Sarah stood by to watch how her charge conducted herself, and, when the toilet was completed, the bed was made up, and the things removed, and soon afterwards breakfast was brought her, together with a common fir chair and a small table, and when she had finished her meal, she was again left to her own solitary meditations.

No sooner was all quiet, than Chirsty arose for the purpose of looking out of the window, that she might try at least to gain some knowledge of her position. She discovered that the walls of the building were extremely thick, that the window was powerfully barred with iron, and that a wooden shade projected over it from above, so as entirely to shut out any direct view outwards. By placing the chair near the window, however, and standing upon it, she commanded a limited view downwards between the sole and the lower edge of the wooden projection, and from this she was enabled to satisfy herself that her chamber was on one side of a narrow square court, for she saw the lower part of the buildings that inclosed the three other sides of it. Guessing from the windows that came within her view below, the court was surrounded with cells similar to her own. The startling fact now arose in her mind, that she had thus in one minute made herself as much acquainted with all the objects on which she could bring her eyes to bear from this her place of confinement, as she could do were she to occupy it for half a century. There was something chilling in the reflection, and her soul naturally began to pant in a tenfold degree for liberty. But that day passed away, and the next, and the next, and no kind uncle came to relieve her.

"Is there no message from my uncle?" said she at last, as Sarah came to her one morning.

"None!" said the old woman, somewhat more gruffly than usual.

"I would fain write a letter to him," said Chirsty.

"I see no use in that," said Sarah quitting the cell hastily, as if to avoid further question.

She did not see the old woman again for several days. Nancy, the little girl already mentioned, attended on her at the usual hours. In vain she tried to prevail on her to procure her writing materials. Her answer was, that she had no means of doing so. She asked for books or work, but the girl's answer was the same. At length old Sarah appeared again.

"Any intelligence from my uncle, good Sarah?" said Chirsty.

"None!" replied her keeper, in the same tone she had used before.

"Then, I beseech you, give me the means of communicating with him by letter," said she earnestly.

"Tush, I tell you it would be of no use," replied Sarah.

"Nay, give me but pen, ink, and paper, and let me try," said Chirsty. "I am sure he would never allow me to be one moment here, if he could only see and converse with me. Oh! if I could but see him for five minutes, this harassing captivity would be at an end."

"Well, then!" said Sarah, after a silence of some moments, during which she appeared to be weighing circumstances in her mind. "Well, then, you shall see un. But see how you behave! Follow me, then, and I shall bring you to your uncle."

"Oh, thank you, thank you! a thousand and a thousand times!" cried Chirsty, almost embracing the old woman in the height of her joy. "Depend upon it, I shall satisfy you as to my behaviour."

Sarah now opened the door of the cell, and Chirsty followed her. Even the small additional motion of her limbs which she now enjoyed, was luxury to her after the narrow bounds to which she had been confined. The old woman led her along the passage for a considerable way, down one flight of steps, along another passage, to the very end of it, and there she stopped opposite a door, secured by little more than the ordinary fastenings used to any private chamber. Sarah opened it and desired Chirsty to enter. The light of heaven was permitted to pass fully in at the window, and she rushed forward to meet her uncle's embrace. But ere she had gone two steps into the room, her eyes caught a spectacle that effectually arrested her.

"Merciful Providence, my poor uncle!" she faintly cried; and, tottering towards a pallet-bed that was near to her, she sank down on the side of it, and gazed with grief and with horror on the miserable object before her.

Seated in a wooden elbow chair, she did indeed behold her uncle; but he was there as a mere piece of animated clay. His hair, which always used to be so nicely trimmed and powdered, now hung in long white untamed locks over a countenance so yellow and emaciated as to be absolutely fearful to look upon. Part of it fell over the eyes, which were seen within it like two bits of yellow glass, motionless and void of all speculation. The under jaw hung forward, and the tongue lolled out, as if all muscular power was lost. An old Indian dressing-gown, which Chirsty remembered to have been his pride, as having been presented to him by a great rajah, and as being made of the most valuable stuff that Cashmere could produce, but now begrimed by every species of filth, covered his person. A broad band of girth was passed around his breast under his arms, and attached to the back of his chair, to prevent his weakness or his involuntary motions from precipitating him on the floor. His feet were both occupied in drumming upon the ground, and his hands were extended before him, with the fingers continually crawling like reptiles on his knees, whilst he was ceaselessly emitting a low muttering whine, that never moulded itself into words. The very first glance she had of him convinced Chirsty that her poor uncle was in the last stage of confirmed and hopeless idiocy.

"What would a letter have done, think ye, to such a clod as that 'ere?" demanded the unfeeling wretch Sarah, "or what will you make of un, now you have seen un?"

"My poor unhappy uncle!" said Chirsty, starting from her seat and going fondly towards him, and weeping over him; "how sadly indeed hast thou been changed! When, alas! did this awful affliction fall upon him? But why has he been removed from his own comfortable home to such a place as this?"

"Such a place as this, quotha!" cried Sarah. "Why, what sort of a place would ye have un in? There is not a more comfortabler room in the whole house. And see, if I didn't bring down that 'ere old wardrobe, that we might have summat to hold un's things in; though I must say," added she in an undertone, "that he hasn't much left now that's worth the caring for."

"But why has he been removed to such an establishment as this?" said Chirsty. "Surely, surely, his malady, helpless and unoffending as it has rendered him, could have given no disturbance in his own house, why then has he been torn from it? and how could his wife have agreed to treatment so cruel and so unnecessary?"

"His wife!" exclaimed Sarah with a laugh. "It was his wife who sent un here; and surely his wife has the most natral right to judge what's best for un."

"Horrible!" exclaimed Chirsty, "his wife! There must be some horrible villainy under all this."

"What!" exclaimed Sarah. "What is there horrible in a gay woman like her ridding her house of such a filthy slavering mummy as this? He would be a pretty ornament, truly, to grace some of the rich Mrs. Ross's splendid routes, as I now and then see the papers call them. Besides, she pays well for his board here, and it is our interest not to let un die."

"Rich!" exclaimed Chirsty indignantly. "Her riches are my uncle's riches; and if one spark of Christian feeling yet remained in her bosom, she ought to have employed them in relieving, so far as they could relieve, this most heavy affliction of a just and wise Providence."

"It's not for me to stand argufying with you here, Miss," said Sarah, in a tone of displeasure that led Chirsty to fear a coming storm. "Come, you see you have gotten all the good out of un you can; so you may as well leave un, and go quietly back to your cell."

"For the love of your Redeemer, and as you hope for mercy!" cried Chirsty, throwing herself on her knees before her keeper, "force me not to quit my uncle! To him I owe more than the duty of a child to a parent. Yield but to me the charitable boon of allowing me to watch by him, and to attend to him day and night, and you will render me so happy that I shall cheerfully and voluntarily submit to my present cruel confinement, without once inquiring by whose order it comes, or ever seeking to establish how unnecessarily it has been inflicted upon me. Oh! grant me but this, and may blessings be showered down upon you."

"I must think about it," gruffly replied Sarah. "In the meantime, you must back to your cell for this day at least. So bid un good-by for this bout. We shall see how you behave, and we shall talk more of the matter to-morrow."

Chirsty rose from her knees; and seeing that it was only through submissive obedience that she could hope to obtain what she so ardently wished, she went to her uncle, and taking up his unconscious hand, she kissed it, watered it with her tears, and then slowly left the apartment, and returned to her cell, where she was locked up as before.

She was no sooner left to herself, than so many circumstances and reflections occurred to her mind, that it had enough of occupation. She now remembered that after having had regular letters from her uncle for a considerable time, they had all at once ceased. But as the irregularity of Indian correspondence was even more common in those days than it is now, she had regretted this as arising from unfortunate accident, without being very much surprised at it. But much as she had had reason to believe that her aunt was a heartless selfish woman, she never could have imagined that she could have been guilty of conduct so unfeeling towards the unhappy man from whose affection she now derived all that wealth which it appeared she was spending so gaily. As to herself, a moment's thought was enough to convince her that she owed her present confinement more to the malice than to the care of her aunt. She remembered that the only communication from India that contained the intimation that she was about to return to Britain, as well as the name of the ship in which she was to sail, also conveyed the full assurance of the perfect restoration of her mind from its temporary malady. The person who knew to what ship to send for her on her arrival, therefore, must necessarily have known that she required no such treatment as that to which she had been so wickedly subjected. Villainy of the darkest dye, therefore, had been at work against her; and where or how it might end she trembled to think. But the thought of her poor uncle's melancholy situation banished every other consideration from her mind; and all her thoughts and wishes were now concentrated in the desire she felt to stay by him, and to watch over him to the last--the very idea of such a self-devotion being balm to her lacerated heart, as affording her the luxury of indulging that deep gratitude with which his unvarying kindness towards her had always filled her, and which she never hoped to have had any opportunity of repaying. She failed not, therefore, to employ all her meekness and all her eloquence to persuade Sarah to grant her request; and as the gentle drop by frequent repetition will at last wear through the hardest flint, so by repeated appeals to the best of the few feelings which that callous-hearted creature possessed, she at last succeeded in obtaining a limited permission to visit her uncle, which was extended by degrees so far, that she ultimately came to be allowed to go to his chamber in the morning, and to remain with him till he was laid to rest at night, when she was removed for the purpose of being locked up in her own cell. In this employment Chirsty forgot her confinement altogether, and weeks, months, nay even years rolled away with no other occupation but that and her devotions. There were times when she even flattered herself that the unremitting attention which she paid to him was not without some material advantage to his general state. She even thought she saw some amendment in a seeming approach to a certain degree of consciousness. Words, though altogether incoherent and unconnected, would now and then break from him, as if he was following out and giving utterance to some musing dream; and on such occasions she would hang over him with anxious fondness and intense interest, with the hope of catching their meaning. Then she could distinctly perceive that at such times his glassy eyes, which were usually directed upon vacancy, would fix themselves upon her, assume a strange and unwonted animation, as if the dormant spirit had arisen for a moment and come to the windows of its earthly house, to look out upon her,--but alas! when she turned slowly away to try its powers, there was no corresponding motion of the head to maintain the proper direction and level of the eyes towards their object, and she would weep at the cruel failure of her hopes that followed.