The Morning After the Battle.
The morning sun rose dimly in a bank of clouds. It found Charles
still clinging to the remains of poor Aloysia, and bathing with kisses
and tears the stiffened features of her beloved sister. With a silken
kerchief she had bandaged the fatal gash on her neck, believing she
might be only in a swoon and might recover. Hope, which is the last
comfort to abandon man in his most desperate condition, scarcely
retarded for Charles the awful reality of her bereavement.
The pale moon that has rolled over so many generations, and lent its
dim, silvery light to so many thrilling vicissitudes, never looked
down on a sadder scene. Death has no pang equal to the blow it give
true affection. No language could describe what the heart feels on
occasions like this. There sat the delicate French girl, alone in the
dark night, on the side of Vesuvius, in the midst of the bleeding
victims of the bloody fight, and clasping to her heart the cold,
lifeless body of her ill-fated sister.
Her sudden and awful end, swept, perhaps, into eternity without a
moment's notice, to be buried in the ashes of the volcano, amidst the
dishonored remains of outlaws and murderers--does not the thought
strike us that this sad fate was more the due of Alvira than the
innocent and harmless Aloysia?
Alvira felt it, and her repentant heart was almost broke.
"O Aloysia!" hear her moan over the angelic form, "you innocent and I
guilty; you slain, judged, and I free to heap greater ingratitude on
the Being who has saved me. Aloysia, forgive! Thou wert dragged up
unwillingly to these desperate scenes of bloodshed by my infatuation.
O God! strike me. I am the wretch; let this angel live to honor thee
in the angelic simplicity of innocence!"
Never was a fairer flower blasted by the lightning of Heaven. Neither
Charles nor Henry knew what was before them in their march to Vesuvius.
To surround and capture a few runaways was perhaps the most they
expected; and Henry, in the confiding affection of her heart, clung
to Charles, determined to bear fatigue and hardship rather than be
separated from her.
It must be a painful picture that fancy will paint of the last hour
of this lovely child. The anguish of her heart must have been keener
than the deep wound that sent the life-streams to mingle with the lava
of the mountain: no one to minister a drop of water to her parched
lips; no friendly voice to console her; the moans and imprecations of
the wounded brigands grating on her ears; the thought that her sister,
too, was perhaps lying in pain, and sinking from her wounds; and, above
all--that which, perhaps, sent the last blush to her cheek--the fear
of the discovery of her sex, and the rough gaze of a brutal soldiery.
But Heaven's sympathizing spirits were gathered around this child of
misfortune, and doubtless with her last sigh he breathed her pure
soul into their hands, and the last wish was answered--for she was
good and innocent before God.
When the sun had fully risen, Charles was approached by a sergeant
of the troops, who announced to her that the captain had died during
the night from his wounds, and, as she was the senior officer, they
waited her orders. Dissembling her grief, Charles rose to her feet
and gave directions that the bodies of the captain and her brother
should be buried in their clothes and wrapped in the flag of the
country. The hardy veterans raised the delicate frame of Henry, and
carried it on a rude bier to the hut where the remains of the captain
were prepared for interment. Silent and solemn was the funeral cortege.
No drum, not a funeral note, was heard. Every eye was wet, and the
breast of Charles was not the only one that heaved the farewell sigh
over the young and beautiful officer.
Charles stood by to see the last of her sister. The dark, black sand
was poured down on her lovely face, and silently and quickly her
mountain grave was filled by the blood-stained hands of her companions
in arms.