It was a cold, dreary morning in the month of December, a heavy snow lay
upon the ground, and the wind whistled around the northeast corner of
the post-office; the streets were nearly deserted; none ventured out but
those whose business rendered it absolutely necessary. I sat at the
window watching the flakes of snow as they peeled from the roofs of the
opposite houses and scattered their whitened particles on the pavement
beneath.
The Southern mail had arrived, and all the business-letters were
delivered; a drowsy feeling crept over me, and I was just falling into
the Lethean lake of forgetfulness,—that dreamy portion of our life,
without which this paradise, this glorious world, with its riches and
its charms, would be as a howling desert.
“Sleep, sweet restorer, balmy sleep.”
But I am digressing. I was awakened from my slumber by a slight touch
upon the elbow and a tremulous voice uttering the words, “Sir! sir!”
“Madam!” cried I, starting up.
“I am sorry to disturb you, sir, but I wish to know if there are any
letters from my son?”
Honest creature: she looked the picture of distress; the widow of hope
as well as kin, her age apparently about fifty, her dress neat but
indicating poverty,—the hand of Time had furrowed her cheek and left his
impress there.
“From your son, madam?”
“Yes, sir, my only son: a good, brave boy, and my only dependence; he
lives in New Orleans, and sends me my little allowance every month. Is
there any, sir?”
“What is your name?”
“Williams, sir,—Mary Williams.”
“Here are two letters, ma’am, for Mary Williams.”
“That is me, sir; and that is his handwriting, dear, good boy! he never
will forget his aged mother.”
“Fifty cents, ma’am.”
“Fifty cents, sir! my William always pays for the letters.”
“In this instance he has failed to do so.”
“What shall I do?”
“I think you said, ma’am, that your son sends you a monthly allowance:
so probably one of these letters contains it.”
The letter was opened, and, as I anticipated, a ten-dollar bill was
enclosed.
After the departure of the old lady I began to weave an imaginary tale
from the simple incident attending her appearance. Her son was in New
Orleans: it was true, the season was healthy,—the winter there being in
point of salubrity the very antipodes of the summer,—still, an undefined
presentiment of a something yet in embryo glided across my brain. I
noted down the facts that had already occurred, and in the mean time
gathered materials for other tales.
Two months passed away, and a letter remained in the post-office for
Mrs. Mary Williams. In taking it up I accidentally noticed the careless
manner in which it was folded. The following scraps of sentences were
distinct and legible:—
“Business very dull—but two dollars a day—sickness—doctor’s bill—I never
go to the gambling-house—what made you think so?—send money next week.”
It was evident from this that William had got into bad company, and
although he denied frequenting the gambling-houses, those sinks of
iniquity, those common sewers for draining from the weak and dissipated
their hard earnings, yet I felt assured that he was lost, and his mother
left in her old days poor and destitute, relying upon the cold charity
of the world for the common means of subsistence. Her brave and noble
boy, as she had fondly called him, was now drawn into the vortex of
vice, from whose baneful and impetuous influence the tears, the cries,
the agonizing grief of her who doted upon him, to whose existence her
whole soul seemed linked, could not rescue him. The spark of filial
affection was extinguished, and the love of pleasures, the gratification
of passions, dissipation, and debauchery, had usurped its place. The
winter was now passed away with its wrath: storms and tempests with
their hail, rain, and snow were rushing down the tide of time, and
spring was seen smiling in the dim perspective. It was, I think, in the
early part of March, when Mrs. Williams stood at the window. Her whole
appearance was changed. I forgot to mention she had previously sent for
and received the letter to which I have above alluded. Sickness and
sorrow had done their work. Her eyes were sunken, her cheeks more
furrowed, and poverty still more strikingly displayed in her person. To
her question, “Are there any letters for me?” that powerful monosyllable
“No!” was another shock to the poor mother. She stood a while in
silence, the tears rolled down her cheeks, she struggled a while to
restrain her feelings, then fast flowed the sorrowing waters from a
heart surcharged with grief. She turned to depart, but faltered, and at
length overcome, she sat down upon the steps of the post-office and wept
aloud.
There is something unnatural in the weeping of the aged. Youth is the
seed-time of the harvest, and hath its sunshine and clouds. But age is
the garnered fruit, the sere and the yellow leaf of all that was
beautiful. When age weeps, ’tis for youth, not for itself. I gazed on
the heart-broken woman before me, and thought of her many nights and
days of anguish. I thought of all her bright visions of hope and joy
which shone through her son and lighted the path of her future. They
were all vanished, and here she lay in utter darkness and desolation.
I spoke to her: she looked up. I told her if she would leave her address
I would send a letter, as soon as it came, to her home.
“Home!” she exclaimed; “I have none! Yes, yes, I have!” Reader, it was
the poor-house!
Week after week elapsed: no letter came for the aged widow. One day I
accidentally took up a New Orleans paper. Curiosity prompted me to read
it more carefully than usual: the paper fell from my hand; my worst
apprehensions for Mary Williams were realized.
* * * * *
I stood at the bedside of the widow,—she lay on one of straw, beside
which stood a table containing sundry bottles of medicine, and near her
a Bible, upon which were a pair of common steel spectacles, black and
rusted with age. She instantly recognized me.
“Ah! you have brought me a letter from my dear boy. I knew he would not,
could not, desert his poor mother. How is he? where is he?”
* * * * *
Reader, here I close my sketch, the remembrance of which haunts me
still, and the last sigh, the last pang of the heart-broken widow will
be as the monitor to prompt me to deeds of charity, with a heart alive
to the cries of the suffering, and a feeling of joy at their alleviation
which I could not previously have experienced.
_THE SIREN._
The morning was one in May, the first of the month. All nature was
smiling and putting forth, like the gay daughters of earth, her
ever-beauteous charms. I had just returned from a long ramble in the
country, and reluctantly seated myself at the window to distribute the
thoughts, the opinions, the love, the hatred, the wisdom, and the
follies of mankind through the medium of letters.
Passing over several commonplace, everyday applicants, I was at last
struck with the interesting appearance of a young lady who could not
have attained the age of eighteen. There was, however, a certain
expression of the countenance, a lurking devil—if I may use the
expression—in her eye, denoting alike ungovernable passions and a
reckless disregard of the consequences attending their gratification.
The study of human nature for years, and a close observation of all its
wire-workings _and mappings of the face_, which my position had a
tendency to improve, have made me conversant with many of those signs
which the bad passions of the human heart cannot keep in its deep
recess, but send forth as warnings to the young and unwary to shun them
as they would a pestilence. She gave her name as Caroline Somerville.
There were fourteen letters to her address, the postage of which
amounted to nearly three dollars. Her correspondence seemed to embrace
the four quarters of the globe: for amongst them were two ship
letters,—one from Bordeaux, the other from a small town in Scotland. I
immediately set her down as one of our best female customers.
I think it was on the third day from her first application at the office
that I noticed in her handwriting a note addressed to a merchant of this
city,—a man of family and reputed a model of his sex, and a pattern for
husbands. This excited an unusual excitement within me.
What could she have to do with Middleton? There was nothing in common
between them. His situation in life, his moral character and standing in
society were all opposed to the bare supposition of such a thing.
In the mean time, by the usual method, I deciphered the following words:
“Pardon the freedom”—“No. 26 Gaskill Street”—“alone, seven
o’clock”—“drop a note”: these were all I could make out; but they were
sufficient. The character and plots of the siren were no longer a
subject of doubt. I knew her as well from those unconnected sentences as
if her whole history had been written out before me. She was, in the
literal sense of the word, A FEMALE SEDUCER.
The next question that presented itself to my mind was, would Middleton
pay any attention to her? That he would not admitted scarcely a shadow
of doubt: he might probably reply to her note, but only to refuse and
remonstrate with her upon the folly and imprudence, if not guilt, of
her conduct.
I handed him the letter myself: he remarked immediately that it was not
one of business. The seal was broken and the letter was read with an
eagerness that surprised me. He placed it carefully in his pocket-book
and departed. Towards evening Caroline received through me an answer
from Mr. Middleton, in which I discovered he promised to meet her. From
that period there came a change over his dream of life: I could not but
mark the wasted form and haggard looks which others would attribute to
different causes. I possessed the key to unlock the truth, but _that_
formed no part of my _vocation_.
Weeks, nay, months, elapsed, and I was only reminded of this
circumstance by the daily appearance of Middleton. The few short months
were as years upon the calendar of his face, while the curse of memory
was dragging him with an iron grasp to an early tomb. One day he told
me, in a manner evidently intended to convey the request more as a
matter of business than otherwise, to deliver his letters to no person
but himself: “remember,” he repeated, “to _no one_, if you please, sir.”
I promised to follow his instructions strictly. He had his reasons, and
I knew it.
As I had anticipated, his wife, a lovely woman, in the fulness of life’s
bloom, rich in accomplishments, the _observed_ of all _observers_,
called at the office; I could detect beneath the bland smile the
canker-worm of domestic sorrow; the seeds of misery were sown, the
harvest was ripening.
“Are there any letters here for Mr. Middleton?”
If I detest any thing in the world, it is the telling of a white lie; it
soon leads to a black one. I replied that there were, but orders had
been given to deliver them to no person but himself.
“Orders, sir?—did he leave such orders?”
“He did, madam.”
She struggled with passion; it was, however, in vain. The words,
“perjured villain,” escaped her, and she left the office.
I could now imagine their domestic scenes,—conscious guilt on the one
side, injured and insulted innocence on the other. But even this was
doomed to have an end.
A report ran through the city that a murder had been committed at No. 26
Gaskill Street. Good heavens! The dwelling of Caroline! I hurried to the
scene of blood, and there lay the dead body of Middleton, and beside
him, in the custody of two officers, his murderer,—a youthful paramour
of this modern Jezebel.
He forfeited his life upon the gallows, and Caroline Somerville died of
_mania a potu_ in the alms-house.
What became of the wife of the unfortunate Middleton? the reader may
inquire. Do you see that little red frame-house which stands alone; that
one with the neat little garden connected with it? There resides Mrs.
Middleton, the once happy wife, together with her four small children:
to maintain them she takes in washing. Yes, reader, such, alas! is her
destiny.
The tide of public opinion rolls from crime, even while it carries upon
its bosom many a bark freighted with the unhallowed cargo, and involves
many an innocent victim in its reckless and overwhelming course. She is
now alone in the world, with none to sympathize, none to alleviate her
anguish. Her little ones are the peopled world in which she moves;
beyond that all is chaos.