seizedher limbs, and drops of chilling sweat stood upon her face. Immediatelya horrid hoarse voice burst from amidst the gloom of her apartment,"_Begone! begone from this house!_" The bed on which she lay then seemedto be agitated, and directly she perceived some person crawling on itsfoot. Every consideration, except present safety, was relinquished;instantaneously she sprang from the bed to the floor--with convulsedgrasp, seized the candle, flew to the fire and lighted it. She gazedwildly around the room--no new object was visible. With timid step sheapproached the bed; she strictly searched all around and under it, butnothing strange could be found. A thought darted into her mind to leavethe house immediately and fly to John's: this was easy, as the keys ofthe gate and draw-bridge were in her possession. She stopped not toreconsider her determination, but seizing the keys, with the candle inher hand, she unlocked her chamber door, and proceeded cautiously downstairs, fearfully casting her eyes on each side, as she tremblinglyadvanced to the outer door. She hesitated a moment. To what perils wasshe about to expose herself, by thus venturing out at the dead of thenight, and proceeding such a distance alone? Her situation she thoughtcould become no more hazardous, and she was about to unbar the door,when she was alarmed by a deep, hollow sigh. She looked around and saw,stretched on one side of the hall, the same ghastly form which had sorecently appeared standing by her bedside. The same haggard countenance,the same awful appearance of murderous death. A faintness came upon her;she turned to flee to her chamber--the candle dropped from her tremblinghand, and she was shrouded in impenetrable darkness. She groped to findthe stairs: as she came near their foot, a black object, apparently inhuman shape, stood before her, with eyes which seemed to burn like coalsof fire, and red flames issuing from its mouth. As she stood fixed amoment in inexpressible trepidation, a large ball of fire rolled alongthe hall, towards the door, and burst with an explosion which seemed torock the building to its deepest foundation. Melissa closed her eyes andsunk senseless to the floor. She revived and got to her chamber, shehardly knew how; locked her door, lighted another candle, and afteragain searching the room, flung herself into a chair, in a state of mindwhich almost deprived her of reason.
Daylight soon appeared, and the cheerful sun darting its enlivening raysthrough the crevices and windows of the antique mansion, recovered herexhausted spirits, and dissipated, in some degree, the terrors whichhovered about her mind. She endeavoured to reason coolly on the eventsof the past night, but reason could not elucidate them. Not the leastnoise had been heard since she last returned to her chamber: shetherefore expected to discover no traits which might tend to adisclosure of those mysteries. She consoled herself only with a fixeddetermination to leave the desolate mansion. Should John come there thatday, he might be prevailed on to permit her to remain at her aunt'sapartment in his house until her aunt should return. If he should notcome before sunset, she resolved to leave the mansion and proceed there.
She took some refreshment and went down stairs: she found the doors andwindows all fast as she had left them. She then again searched everyroom in the house, both above and below, and the cellar; but shediscovered no appearance of there having been any person there. Not thesmallest article was displaced; every thing appeared as it had formerlybeen.--She then went to the gate; it was locked as usual, and thedraw-bridge was up. She again traversed the circuit of the wall, butfound no alteration, or any place where it was possible the enclosuremight be entered. Again she visited the outer buildings, and evenentered the cemetery, but discovered not the least circumstance whichcould conduce to explain the surprising transactions of the precedingnight. She however returned to her room in a more composed frame ofspirit, confident that she should not remain alone another night in thatgloomy, desolate, and dangerous solitude.
Towards evening Melissa took her usual walk around the enclosure. It wasthat season of the year when weary summer is lapsing into the arms offallow autumn.--The day had been warm, and the light gales borerevigorating coolness on their wings as they tremulously agitated thefoliage of the western forest, or fluttered among the branches of thetrees surrounding the mansion. The green splendours of spring had begunto fade into a yellow lustre, the flowery verdure of the fields waschanged to a russet hue. A robin chirped on a neighbouring oak, a wrenchattered beneath, swallows twittered around the decayed buildings, theludicrous mocking bird sung sportively from the top of the highest elmand the surrounding groves rung with varying, artless melody; while deepin the adjacent wilderness the woodcock, hammering on some dry andblasted trees, filled the woods with reverberant echoes. The Sound wasonly ruffled by the lingering breezes, as they idly wandered over itssurface. Long Island, now in possession of the British troops, wasthinly enveloped in smoky vapour; scattered along its shores lay thenumerous small craft and larger ships of the hostile fleet. A few skiffswere passing and repassing the Sound, and several American gun-boats layoff a point which jutted out from the main land, far to the eastward.Numberless summer insects mingled their discordant strains amidst theweedy herbage. A heavy black cloud was rising in the north west, whichseemed to portend a shower, as the sonorous, distant thunder was at longintervals distinctly heard.
Melissa walked around the yard, contemplating the varying beauties ofthe scene: the images of departed joys--the days when Alonzo hadparticipated with her in admiring the splendours of rural prospects,raised in her bosom the sigh of deep regret. She entered the garden andtraversed the alleys, now overgrown with weeds and tufted knot-grass.The flower beds were choaked with the low running bramble and tanglingfive-finger; tall, rank rushes, mullens and daisies, had usurped theempire of the kitchen garden. The viny arbour was broken, andprincipally gone to decay; yet the "lonely wild rose" blushed mournfullyamidst the ruins. As she passed from the garden she involuntarilystopped at the cemetery: she paused in serious reflection:--"Here, saidshe, in this house of gloom rest, in undisturbed silence, my honourableancestors, once the active tenants of yonder mansion. Then, throughoutthese solitary demesnes, the busy occurrences of life glided in cheerfulcircles. Then, these now moss-clad alleys, and this wild weedy garden,were the resort of the fashionable and the gay. Then, evening musicfloated over the fields, while yonder halls and apartments shone inbrilliant illumination. Now all is sad, solitary and dreary, the hauntof spirits and spectres of nameless terror. All that now remains of thehead that formed, the hand that executed, and the bosom that relishedthis once happy scenery, is now, alas, only a heap of dust."
She seated herself on a little hillock, under a weeping willow, whichstood near the cemetery, and watched the rising shower, which ascendedin gloomy pomp, half hidden behind the western groves, shrouding the lowsun in black vapour, while coming thunders more nearly and more awfullyrolled. The shrieking night hawk[A] soared high into the air, minglingwith the lurid van of the approaching storm, which widening, morerapidly advanced, until "the heavens were arrayed in blackness."
[Footnote A: Supposed to be the male whippoorwill; well known in the New-England states, and answering to the above peculiarity.]
The lightning broader and brighter flashes, hurling down its forkystreaming bolts far in the wilderness, its flaming path followed by thevollying artillery of the skies. Now bending its long, crinkling spiresover the vallies, now glimmering along the summit of the hills.Convolving clouds poured smoky volumes through the expansion; a deep,hollow, distant roar, announced the approach of "summoned winds." Thewhole forest bowed in awful grandeur, as from its dark bosom rushed theimpetuous hurricane, twisting off, or tearing up by the roots, thestoutest trees, whirling the heaviest branches through the air withirresistible fury. It dashed upon the sea, tossed it into irregularmountains, or mingled its white foamy spray with the gloom of the turbidskies. Slant-wise, the large heavy drops of rain began to descend.Melissa hastened to the mansion; as she reached the door a verybrilliant flash of lightning, accompanied by a tremendous explosion,alarmed her. A thunder bolt had entered a large elm tree within theenclosure, and with a horrible crash, had shivered it from top tobottom
. She unlocked the door and hurried to her chamber. Deep night nowfilled the atmosphere; the rain poured in torrents, the wind rocked thebuilding, and bellowed in the adjacent groves: the sea raged and roared,fierce lightnings rent the heavens, alternately involving the world inthe sheeted flame of its many coloured fires; thunders rolled awfullyaround the firmament, or burst with horrid din, bounding andreverberating among the surrounding woods, hills and vallies. It seemednothing less than the crash of worlds sounding through the universe.
Melissa walked her room, listening to the wild commotion of theelements. She feared that if the storm continued, she should becompelled to pass another night in the lone mansion: if so, she resolvednot to go to bed. She now suddenly recollected that in her haste toregain her chamber, she had forgotten to lock the outer door. The shockshe had received when the lightning demolished the elm tree, was thecause of this
Alonzo and Melissa; Or, The Unfeeling Father: An American Tale Page 14
