“Not to my knowledge,” rejoined the
courier, “my message is to your Colonel,
from a dying man; will you point out his
station?” the soldier complied, and the message
was soon delivered, and Pendennyss
prepared to obey its summons immediately.
Preceded by the messenger as a guide, and
followed by Harmer, the Earl retraced his
steps, over that ground he had but a few hours
before been engaged on, in the deadly strife
of man to man, hand to hand.

How different is the contemplation of a
field of battle, during and after the conflict.
The excitement—suspended success—shouts,
uproar, and confusion of the former, prevent
any contemplation of the nicer parts, of
this confused mass of movements, charges
and retreats; or if a brilliant advance is
made, a masterly retreat effected, the imagination
is chained by the splendour and glory
of the act, without resting for a moment, on
the sacrifice of individual happiness with
which it is purchased. A battle ground from
which the whir wind of the combat has
passed, presents a different sight—it offers the
very consummation of human misery.

There may be occasionally an individual,
who from station, distempered mind, or the
encouragement of chimerical ideas of glory,
quits the theatre of life with at least the
appearance of pleasure in his triumphs; if
such there be in reality, if this rapture of

[figure description] Page 318.[end figure description]

departing glory be any thing more than the
deception of a distempered excitement, the
subject of its exhibition, is to be greatly pitied.

To the Christian, dying in peace with both
God and man, can it alone be ceded in the
eye of reason, to pour out his existence, with
a smile on his quivering lip.

And the warrior, who falls in the very
arms of victory, after passing a life devoted
to the world; even if he sees kingdoms hang
suspended on his success, may smile indeed—
may utter sentiments full of loyalty and zeal--
may be the admiration of the world—and
what is his reward? a deathless name, and
an existence of misery, which knows no termination.

Christianity alone can make us good soldiers
in any cause, for he who knows how to
live, is always the least afraid to die.

Pendennyss and his companions pushed
their way over the ground occupied before
the battle by the enemy, descended into, and
through that little valley, in which yet lay in
undistinguished confusion, masses of dead
and the dying of either side; and again over
the ridge, on which could be marked the
situation of those gallant Squares, which had
so long resisted the efforts of the horse and
artillery, by the groups of bodies, fallen
where they had bravely stood, until even
the callous Harmer, sickened with the sight
of a waste of life, he had but a few hours
before exultingly contributed to increase.

[figure description] Page 319.[end figure description]

Appeals to their feelings as they rode
through the field had been frequent, and their
progress much retarded, by their attempts to
contribute to the ease of a wounded or a dying
man: but as the courier constantly urged
their speed, as the only means of securing the
object of their ride, these halts were reluctantly
abandoned.

It was ten o'clock before they reached the
farm house, where lay in the midst of hundreds
of his countrymen, the former lover of
Jane.

As the subject of his confession must be
anticipated by the reader, we will give a
short relation of his life, and those acts which
more materially affect our history.

Henry Egerton had been turned early on
the world, like hundreds of his countrymen,
without any principle, to counteract the arts
of infidelity, or resist the temptations of life.
His father held a situation under government,
and was devoted to his rise in the diplomatic
line. His mother, a woman of fashion, who
lived for effect, and idle competition with her
sisters in weakness and folly. All he learnt
in his father's house, was selfishness, from
the example of one, and a love of high life
and its extravagance, from the other, of his
parents.

He entered the army young---from choice.
The splendour and reputation of the service,
caught his fancy; and he was, by pride and
constitution, indifferent to personal danger.
Yet he loved London and its amusements

[figure description] Page 320.[end figure description]

better than glory; and the money of his uncle,
Sir Edgar, whose heir he was reputed
to be, had raised him to the rank of Lieutenant
Colonel, without his spending an hour
in the field.

Egerton had some abilities, and a good
deal of ardour of temperament, by nature.
The former from indulgence and example,
degenerated into the acquiring the art to
please in mixed society; and the latter, from
want of employment, expended itself at the
card table. The very irritability of genius,
is dangerous to an idle man. It prompts to
mischief, if it be not employed in good.

The association between the vices is intimate.
There really appears to be a kind of modesty
in sin, that makes it ashamed of good company.
If we are unable to reconcile a favourite
propensity to our principles, we are apt to
abandon the unpleasant restraint on our actions,
rather than admit the incongruous
mixture—freed entirely from the fetters of
our morals, what is there our vices will not
prompt us to commit? Egerton, like thousands
of others, went on from step to step in
the abandonment of virtue, until he found
himself in the world, free to follow all his inclinations,
so he violated none of the decencies
of life—and this consisted in detection—
what was hid did no harm.

When in Spain, on service in his only
campaign, he was accidentally, as has been

[figure description] Page 321.[end figure description]

mentioned, thrown in the way of the Donna
Julia, and brought her off the ground, under
the influence of natural sympathy and national
feeling—a kind of merit that makes vice
only more dangerous, by making it sometimes
amiable. He had not seen his dependant
long, before her beauty, situation, and
his passions, decided him to effect her ruin.

This was an occupation, his figure, manners
and propensities had made him an adept
in, and nothing was farther from his thoughts
than the commission of any other, than the
crime a gentleman might be guilty of (in his
opinion) with impunity.

It is however the misfortune of sin, that
from being our slave it becomes a tyrant, and
Egerton attempted what in other countries,
and where the laws ruled, might have cost
him his life.

The conjecture of Pendennyss was true—
he saw the face of the officer who had interposed,
between him and his villanous attempt,
but was hid himself from view—he
aimed not at his life, but his own escape;
happily his first shot succeeded, for the Earl
would have been sacrificed, to preserve the
character of a man of honour; though no one
was more regardless of the estimation he was
held in by the virtuous than Colonel Egerton.

In pursuance of his plans on Mrs. Fitzgerald,
the Colonel had sedulously avoided
admitting any of his companions, into the
secret of his having a female in his care.

[figure description] Page 322.[end figure description]

When he left the army to return home, he
remained until a movement of the troops to
a distant part of the country, enabled him to
effect his own purposes, without incurring
their ridicule; and when he found himself
obliged to abandon his vehicle, for a refuge
in the woods, the fear of detection made him
alter his course, and under the pretence of
wishing to be in a battle about to be fought,
he secretly rejoined the army, and the gallantry
of Colonel Egerton was mentioned in
the next despatches.

Sir Herbert Nicholson commanded the
advanced guard, at which the Earl arrived
with the Donna Julia, and like every other
brave man (unless guilty himself) was indignant
at the villany of the fugitive. The
times, confusion and enormities, daily practiced
in the theatre of the war, prevented any
close inquiries into the subject, and circumstances
had so enveloped Egerton in mystery,
that nothing but an interview with the lady
herself was likely to expose him.

With Sir Herbert Nicholson he had been in
habits of intimacy, and on that gentleman's
alluding in a conversation in the barracks at
F—to the lady, brought into his quarters
before Lishon, he accidentally omitted mentioning
the name of her rescuer. Egerton
had never before heard the transaction spoken
of, and as he had of course never mentioned
the subject himself, was ignorant of
who interfered between him and his views,

[figure description] Page 323.[end figure description]

also of the fate of Donna Julia; indeed, he
thought it probable that it had not much improved
by a change of guardians.

In his object in coming into Northamptonshire
he had several views; he wanted a
temporary retreat from his creditors. Jarvis
had an infant fondness for play, without
an adequate skill, and the money of
the young ladies, in his necessities, was becoming
of importance; but the daughters of
Sir Edward Moseley were of a description
more suited to his taste, and their portions
were as ample as the others: he had become
in some degree attached to Jane, and as her
imprudent parents, satisfied with his possessing
the exterior and requisite recommendations
of a gentleman, admitted his visits
freely, he determined to make her his wife.

When he met Denbigh the first time, he saw
chance had thrown him in the way of a man
who might hold his character in his power;
he had never seen Pendennyss, and it will
be remembered, was ignorant of the name
of Julia's friend; he now learnt, for the first
time, that it was Denbigh: uneasy at he
knew not what, fearful of some exposure, he
knew not how, when Sir Herbert alluded to
the occurrence—with a view to rebut the
charge, if Denbigh should choose to make
one; with the near sightedness of guilt. he
pretended to know the occurrence, and under
the promise of secrecy, mentioned that the
name of the officer was Denbigh; he had

[figure description] Page 324.[end figure description]

noticed Denbigh, avoiding Sir Herbert at
the ball, and judging others from himself,
thought it was a wish to avoid any allusions
to the lady he had brought into the others
quarters that induced the measure; he was in
hopes that if Denbigh was not as guilty as himself,
he was sufficiently so, to wish to keep the
transaction from the eyes of Emily: he was
however prepared for an explosion or an alliance
with him, when the sudden departure
of Sir Herbert removed the danger of a collision—
believing at last they were to be brothers-in
law, and mistaking the Earl for his
cousin, whose name he bore, Egerton became
reconciled to the association; while
Pendennyss having in his absence heard on
inquiring some of the vices of the Colonel,
was debating with himself, whether he should
expose them to Sir Edward or not.

It was in their occasional interchange of
civilities that Pendennyss placed his pocket-book
upon a table, while he exhibited the
plants to the Colonel; the figure of Emily
passing the window, drew him from the
room, and Egerton having ended his examination,
observing the book, put it in his
own pocket, to return it to its owner when
they next met.

The situation; name and history of Mrs.
Fitzgerald were never mentioned by the
Moseleys in public; but Jane, in the confidence
of her affections, had told her lover
who the inmate of the cottage was; the idea

[figure description] Page 325.[end figure description]

of her being kept there by Denbigh, immediately
occurred to him, and although he
was surprised at the audacity of the thing,
he was determined to profit by the occasion.

To pay this visit, he staid away from the
excursion on the water, as Pendennyss did
to avoid his friend, Lord Henry Stapleton.
An excuse of business which served for his
apology, kept the Colonel from seeing Denbigh
to return the book, until after his visit
to the Cottage—his rhapsody of love, and
offers to desert his intended wife, were
nothing but the common place talk of his
purposes; and his presumption in alluding to
his situation with Miss Moseley, proceeded
from his impressions as to Julia's real character;
in this struggle for the bell, the
pocket book of Denbigh accidentally fell
from his coat—and the retreat of the Colonel
was too precipitate to enable him to recover
it.

Mrs. Fitzgerald was too much alarmed to
distinguish nicely, and Egerton proceeded to
the ball room with the indifference of a hardened
offender. When the arrival of Miss
Jarvis, to whom he had committed himself,
prompted him to a speedy declaration, and
the unlucky conversation of Mr. Holt brought
about a probable detection of his gaming propensities,
the Colonel determined to get rid
of his awkward situation and his debts, by a
coup-de-main—he eloped with Miss Jarvis.

[figure description] Page 326.[end figure description]

What portion of the foregoing narrative
made the dying confession of Egerton to the
man he had lately discovered to be the Earl
of Pendennyss, the reader can easily imagine.

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