Immediately after she concluded this interesting epistle, she poured
out her heart in praise to God for preserving and reclaiming him for
whom she had so often wept and prayed, and whom she had loved with
unaltered fervor. She then hastened to communicate the glad tidings to
her mother and Miss Medway, and to despatch a servant to the village
to bring to Roseville the still dear Drayton. He came. Again he beheld
the being he so long had loved. Again he saw William, and exercised
his former influence--but in a holier channel. You can imagine the
scene--the mutual relations--the ensuing courtship, and the result.
Yes, my friend, Lavinia is the wife of Drayton. His large fortune is
now useful in acts of pious benevolence and zeal. His fine talents are
employed in dispensing good; his fascinating manners in winning others
to admire that which made him what he is. William Loraine is snatched
from ruin. His amiable mother is again blessed with duteous and
devoted children. And whence the mighty change? In this simple
narrative stands forth in glowing colors the truth of that maxim, that
the influence of the female sex is great, when enlisted either on the
side of virtue or of vice. Had Lavinia been less prudent and pious,
how great would have been the contrast; and amidst all the blessings
that have attended her through life, none diffuse such thrills of
rapture through her grateful, peaceful heart, as when reflecting on
the history of him, to whom is not inaptly applied the title of "The
Reclaimed."
The evening was far spent. My friend and myself bade each other adieu,
to return to our respective homes--but not without his promising at
some future day to inform me of the history of that young lady, to
whose eventful life he had briefly hinted. Ruminating on the moral of
the narrative, I could but deplore that the fair sex of our state did
not more nearly resemble Lavinia--refuse to unite their destinies with
the slaves of dissipated pleasure, and thereby reclaim from vice
thousands of her victims.