Thus in a moment was this man thrown from the summit
of affluence to the lowest indigence. He had been habituated
to independence and ease. This reverse, therefore, was
the harder to bear. His present situation was much worse
than at his father's death. Then he was sanguine with youth
and glowing with health. He possessed a fund on which he
could commence his operations. Materials were at hand,
and nothing was wanted but skill to use them. Now he had
advanced in life. His frame was not exempt from infirmity.
He had so long reposed on the bosom of opulence and enjoyed
the respect attendant on wealth, that he felt himself
totally incapacitated for a new station. His misfortune had
not been foreseen. It was embittered by the consciousness
of his own imprudence, and by recollecting that the serpent
which had stung him, was nurtured in his own bosom.

It was not merely frugal fare and an humble dwelling to
which he was condemned. The evils to be dreaded were
beggary and contempt. Luxury and leisure were not merely
denied him. He must bend all his efforts to procure
clothing and food, to preserve his family from nakedness
and famine. His spirit would not brook dependence. To
live upon charity, or to take advantage of the compassion of

[figure description] Page 017.[end figure description]

his friends, was a destiny far worse than any other. To this
therefore he would not consent. However irksome and
painful it might prove, he determined to procure his bread
by the labor of his hands.

But to what scene or kind of employment should he betake
himself? He could not endure to exhibit this reverse of
fortune on the same theatre which had witnessed his prosperity.
One of his first measures was to remove from New York
to Philadelphia. How should he employ himself in his new
abode? Painting, the art in which he was expert, would not
afford him the means of subsistence. Though no despicable
musician, he did not esteem himself qualified to be a teacher
of this art. This profession, besides, was treated by his
new neighbors, with general, though unmerited contempt.
There were few things on which he prided himself more than
on the facilities and elegancies of his penmanship. He was
besides well acquainted with arithmetic and accompting.
He concluded therefore, to offer his services as a writer in a
public office. This employment demanded little bodily exertion.
He had spent much of his time at the book and the
desk; his new occupation, therefore, was further recommended
by its resemblance to his ancient modes of life.

The first situation of this kind, for which he applied, he
obtained. The duties were constant, but not otherwise toilsome
or arduous. The emoluments were slender, but by
contracting, within limits as narrow as possible, his expenses,
they could be made subservient to the mere purposes of subsistence.
He hired a small house in the suburbs of the city.
It consisted of a room above and below, and a kitchen.
His wife, daughter, and one girl, composed its inhabitants.

As long as his mind was occupied in projecting and executing
these arrangements, it was diverted from uneasy contemplations.
When his life became uniform, and day followed
day in monotonous succession, and the novelty of his employment
had disappeared, his cheerfulness began likewise to
fade, and was succeeded by unconquerable melancholy.
His present condition was in every respect the contrast of his
former. His servitude was intolerable. He was associated
with sorded hirelings, gross and uneducated, who treated his
age with rude familiarity, and insulted his ears with ribaldry

[figure description] Page 018.[end figure description]

and scurril jests. He was subject to command, and had his
portion of daily drudgery allotted to him, to be performed for
a pittance no more than would buy the bread which he daily
consumed. The task assigned him was technical and formal.
He was perpetually encumbered with the rubbish of
law, and waded with laborious steps through its endless tautologies,
its impertiment circuities, its lying assertions, and
hateful artifices. Nothing occurred to relieve or diversify the
scene. It was one tedious round of scrawling and jargon;
a tissue made up of the shreds and remnants of barbarous
antiquity, polluted with the rust of ages, and patched by the
stupidity of modern workmen, into new deformity.

When the day's task was finished, jaded spirits, and a
body enfeebled by reluctant application, were but little adapted
to domestic enjoyments. These indeed were incompatible
with a temper like his, to whom the privation of the
comforts that attended his former condition, was equivalent
to the loss of life. These privations were still more painful
to his wife, and her death added one more calamity to those
under which he already groaned. He had always loved her
with the tenderest affection, and he justly regarded this evil
as surpassing all his former woes.

But his destiny seemed never weary of persecuting him.
It was not enough that he should fall a victim to the most atrocious
arts, that he should wear out his days in solitude and
drudgery, that he should feel not only the personal restraints
and hardships attendant upon indigence, but the keener pangs
that result from negligence and contumely. He was imperfectly
recovered from the shock occasioned by the death of
his wife, when his sight was invaded by a cataract. Its progress
was rapid, and terminated in total blindness.

He was now disabled from pursuing his usual occupation.
He was shut out from the light of heaven, and debarred of
every human comfort. Condemned to eternal dark, and
worse than the helplessness of infancy, he was dependent for
the meanest offices on the kindness of others, and he who had
formerly abounded in the gifts of fortune, thought only of
ending his days in a gaol or an almshouse.

His situation however was alleviated by one circumstance.
He had a daughter, whom I have formerly mentioned, as the
only survivor of many children. She was sixteen years of

[figure description] Page 019.[end figure description]

age when the storm of adversity fell upon her father's house.
It may be thought that one educated as she had been, in the
gratification of all her wishes, and at an age of timidity and
inexperience, would have been less fitted than her father for
encountering misfortune; and yet, when the task of comforter
fell upon her, her strength was not found wanting. Her fortitude
was immediately put to the test. This reverse did not
only affect her obliquely, and through the medium of her
family, but directly, and in one way usually very distressful to
female feelings.

Her fortune and character had attracted many admirers.
One of them had some reason to flatter himself with success.
Miss Dudley's notions had little in common with those around
her. She had learned to square her conduct, in a considerable
degree, not by the hasty impulses of inclination, but by
the dictates of truth. She yielded nothing to caprice or passion.
Not that she was perfectly exempt from intervals of
weakness, or from the necessity of painful struggles, but these
intervals were transient, and these struggles always successful.
She was no stranger to the pleadings of love, from the
lips of others, and in her own bosom, but its tumults were
brief, and speedily gave place to quiet thoughts and steadfast
purposes.

She had listened to the solicitations of one, not unworthy
in himself, and amply recommended by the circumstances of
family and fortune. He was young, and therefore impetuous.
Of the good that he sought, he was not willing to delay the
acquisition for a moment. She had been taught a very different
lesson. Marriage included vows of irrevocable affection
and obedience. It was a contract to endure for life. To
form this connexion in extreme youth, before time had unfolded
and modelled the characters of the parties, was, in her
opinion, a proof of pernicious and opprobrious temerity. Not
to perceive the propriety of delay in this case, or to be regardless
of the motives that would enjoin upon us a deliberate
procedure, furnished an unanswerable objection to any man's
pretensions. She was sensible, however, that this, like other
mistakes, was curable. If her arguments failed to remove it,
time, it was likely, would effect this purpose. If she rejected
a matrimonial proposal for the present, it was for reasons
that might not preclude her future acceptance of it.

[figure description] Page 020.[end figure description]

Her scruples, in the present case, did not relate to the temper,
or person, or understanding of her lover, but to his age, to
the imperfectness of their acquaintance, and to the want of that
permanence of character which can flow only from the progress
of time and knowledge. These objections, which so
rarely exist, were conclusive with her. There was no danger
of her relinquishing them in compliance with the remonstrances
of parents and the solicitations of her lover, though the one
and the other were urged with all the force of authority and
insinuation. The prescriptions of duty were too clear to
allow her to hesitate and waver, but the consciousness of rectitude
could not secure her from temporary vexations.

Her parents were blemished with some of the frailties of
that character. They held themselves entitled to prescribe
in this article, but they forbore to exert their power. They
condescended to persuade, but it was manifest, that they regarded
their own conduct as a relaxation of right; and, had
not the lover's importunities suddenly ceased, it is not possible
to tell how far the happiness of Miss Dudley might have
been endangered. The misfortunes of her father were no
sooner publicly known, than the youth forbore his visits, and
embarked on a voyage which he had long projected, but
which had been hitherto delayed by a superior regard to the
interests of his passion.

It must be allowed that the lady had not foreseen this
event. She had exercised her judgment upon his character,
and had not been deceived. Before this desertion, had
it been clearly stated to her apprehension, she would have
readily admitted it to be probable. She knew the fascination
of wealth, and the delusiveness of self-confidence. She was
superior to the folly of supposing him exempt from sinister
influences, and deaf to the whispers of ambition, and yet the
manner in which she was affected by this event, convinced
her that her heart had a larger share than her reason in dictating
her expectations.

Yet it must not be supposed that she suffered any very
acute distress on this account. She was grieved less for her
own sake than his. She had no design of entering into marriage,
in less than seven years from this period. Not a single
hope, relative to her own condition, had been frustrated.
She had only been mistaken in her favorable conceptions of

[figure description] Page 021.[end figure description]

another. He had exhibited less constancy and virtue than
her heart had taught her to expect.

With those opinions, she could devote herself, with a single
heart, to the alleviation of her parents' sorrows. This change
in her condition she treated lightly, and retained her cheerfulness
unimpaired. This happened because, in a rational
estimate, and so far as it affected herself, the misfortune was
slight, and because her dejection would only tend to augment
the disconsolateness of her parents, while, on the other hand,
her serenity was calculated to infuse the same confidence into
them. She indulged herself in no fits of exclamation or
moodiness. She listened in silence to their invectives and
laments, and seized every opportunity that offered to inspire
them with courage, to set before them the good, as well as ill,
to which they were reserved, to suggest expedients for improving
their condition, and to soften the asperities of his new
mode of life, to her father, by every species of blandishment
and tenderness.

She refused no personal exertion to the common benefit.
She incited her father to diligence, as well by her example,
as by her exhortations; suggested plans, and superintended
or assisted in the execution of them. The infirmities of sex
and age vanished before the motives to courage and activity
flowing from her new situation. When settled in his new
abode, and profession, she began to deliberate what conduct
was incumbent on herself, how she might participate, with her
father, the burthen of the common maintenance, and blunt
the edge of this calamity by the resources of a powerful and
cultivated mind.

In the first place, she disposed of every superfluous garb
and trinket. She reduced her wardrobe to the plainest and
cheapest establishment. By this means alone, she supplied
her father's necessities with a considerable sum. Her music
and even her books were not spared, not from the slight
esteem in which these were held by her, but because she was
thenceforth to become an economist of time as well as of
money, because musical instruments are not necessary to the
practice of this art in its highest perfection, and because,
books, when she should procure leisure to read, or money to
purchase them, might be obtained in a cheaper and more
commodious form, than those costly and splendid volumes,

[figure description] Page 022.[end figure description]

with which her father's munificence had formerly supplied
her.

To make her expenses as limited as possible, was her next
care. For this end she assumed the province of cook, the
washing of house and clothes, and the cleansing of furniture.
Their house was small, the family consisted of no
more than four persons, and all formality and expensiveness
were studiously discarded, but her strength was unequal to
unavoidable tasks. A vigorous constitution could not supply
the place of laborious habits, and this part of her plan
must have been changed for one less frugal. The aid of a
servant must have been hired, if it had not been furnished
by gratitude.

Some years before this misfortune, her mother had taken
under her protection a girl, the daughter of a poor woman,
who subsisted by labour, and who dying, left this child without
friend or protector. This girl possessed no very improvable
capacity, and therefore, could not benefit by the
benevolent exertions of her young mistress as much as the
latter desired, but her temper was artless and affectionate,
and she attached herself to Constantia with the most entire
devotion. In this change of fortune she would not consent
to be separated, and Miss Dudley, influenced by her affection
to her Lucy, and reflecting that on the whole it was
most to her advantage to share with her, at once, her kindness
and her poverty, retained her as her companion. With
this girl she shared the domestic duties, scrupling not to
divide with her the meanest and most rugged, as well as the
lightest offices.

This was not all. She, in the next place, considered
whether her ability extended no farther than to save. Could
she not by the employment of her hands increase the income
as well as diminish the expense? Why should she
be precluded from all lucrative occupation? She soon
came to a resolution. She was mistress of her needle, and
this skill she conceived herself bound to employ for her own
subsistence.

Clothing is one of the necessaries of human existence.
The art of the tailor is scarcely of less use than that of
the tiller of the ground. There are few the gains of which
are better merited, and less injurious to the principles of

[figure description] Page 023.[end figure description]

human society. She resolved therefore to become a workwoman,
and to employ in this way, the leisure she possessed
from household avocations. To this scheme she was obliged
to reconcile not only herself but her parents. The conquest
of their prejudices was no easy task, but her patience
and skill finally succeeded, and she procured needle work
in sufficient quantity to enable her to enhance in no trivial
degree, the common fund.

It is one thing barely to comply with the urgencies of the
case, and to do that which, in necessitous circumstances is
best. But to conform with grace and cheerfulness, to yield
no place to fruitless recriminations and repinings, to contract
the evils into as small a compass as possible, and extract
from our condition all possible good, is a task of a different
kind.

Mr. Dudley's situation required from him frugality and
diligence. He was regular and unintermitted in his application
to his pen. He was frugal. His slender income was
administered agreeably to the maxims of his daughter; but
he was unhappy. He experienced in its full extent the
bitterness of disappointment.

He gave himself up for the most part to a listless melancholy.
Sometimes his impatience would produce effects
less excusable; and conjure up an accusing and irascible
spirit. His wife and even his daughter he would make the
objects of peevish and absurd reproaches. These were
moments when her heart drooped indeed, and her tears
could not be restrained from flowing. These fits were
transitory and rare, and when they had passed, the father
seldom failed to mingle tokens of contrition and repentance
with the tears of his daughter. Her arguments and soothings
were seldom disappointed of success. Her mother's
disposition was soft and pliant, but she could not accommodate
herself to the necessity of her husband's affairs. She
was obliged to endure the want of some indulgences, but
she reserved to herself the liberty of complaining, and to
subdue this spirit in her was found utterly impracticable.
She died a victim to discontent.

This event deepened the gloom that shrouded the soul
of her father, and rendered the task of consolation still more
difficult. She did not despair. Her sweetness and patience

[figure description] Page 024.[end figure description]

was invincible by any thing that had already happened, but
her fortitude did not exceed the standard of human nature.
Evils now began to menace her, to which it is likely she
would have yielded, had not their approach been intercepted
by an evil of a different kind.

The pressure of grief is sometimes such as to prompt us
to seek a refuge in voluntary death. We must lay aside the
burthen which we cannot sustain. If thought degenerate
into a vehicle of pain, what remains but to destroy that
vehicle? For this end, death is the obvious, but not the
only, or morally speaking, the worst means. There is one
method of obtaining the bliss of forgetfulness, in comparison
with which suicide is innocent.

The strongest mind is swayed by circumstances. There
is no firmness of integrity, perhaps, able to repel every
species of temptation, which is produced by the present
constitution of human affairs, and yet temptation is successful,
chiefly by virtue of its gradual and invisible approaches.
We rush into danger, because we are not aware of its existence,
and have not therefore provided the means of safety,
and the dæmon that seizes us is hourly reinforced by habit.
Our opposition grows fainter in proportion as our adversary
acquires new strength, and the man becomes enslaved by
the most sordid vices, whose fall would, at a former period,
have been deemed impossible, or who would have been imagined
liable to any species of depravity, more than to this.

Mr. Dudley's education had entailed upon him many
errors, yet who would have supposed it possible for him to
be enslaved by a depraved appetite; to be enamoured of
low debauchery, and to grasp at the happiness that intoxication
had to bestow? This was a mournful period in
Constantia's history. My feelings will not suffer me to
dwell upon it. I cannot describe the manner in which
she was affected by the first symptoms of this depravity, the
struggles which she made to counteract this dreadful infatuation,
and the grief which she experienced from the repeated
miscarriage of her efforts. I will not detail her various
expedients for this end, the appeals which she made to his
understanding, to his sense of honor and dread of infamy,
to the gratitude to which she was entitled, and to the injunctions
of parental duty. I will not detail his fits of remorse,

[figure description] Page 025.[end figure description]

his fruitless penitence, and continual relapses, nor depict the
heart-breaking scenes of uproar and violence, and foul disgrace
that accompanied his paroxysms of drunkenness.

The only intellectual amusement which this lady allowed
herself was writing. She enjoyed one distant friend, with
whom she maintained an uninterrupted correspondence, and
to whom she confided a circumstantial and copious relation
of all these particulars. That friend is the writer of these
memoirs. It is not impossible but that these letters may be
communicated to the world, at some future period. The
picture which they exhibit is hourly exemplified and realized,
though, in the many colored scenes of human life, none
surpasses it in disastrousness and horror. My eyes almost
wept themselves dry over this part of her tale.

In this state of things Mr. Dudley's blindness might justly
be accounted, even in its immediate effects, a fortunate event.
It dissolved the spell, by which he was bound, and which,
it is probable, would never have been otherwise broken.
It restored him to himself and showed him, with a distinctness
which made him shudder, the gulf to which he was
hastening. But nothing can compensate to the sufferer the
evils of blindness. It was the business of Constantia's life
to alleviate those sufferings, to cherish and console her father,
and to rescue him, by the labor of her hands from dependence
on public charity. For this end, her industry and
solicitude were never at rest. She was able, by that industry,
to provide him and herself with necessaries. Their
portion was scanty, and, if it sometimes exceeded the standard
of their wants, not less frequently fell short of it. For
all her toils and disquietudes she esteemed herself fully compensated
by the smiles of her father. He indeed could seldom
be prompted to smile, or to suppress the dictates of
that despair which flowed from his sense of this new calamity,
and the aggravations of hardship, which his recent insobrieties
had occasioned to his daughter.

She purchased what books her scanty stock would allow,
and borrowed others. These she read to him when her
engagements would permit. At other times she was accustomed
to solace herself with her own music. The lute
which her father had purchased in Italy, and which had

[figure description] Page 026.[end figure description]

been disposed of among the rest of his effects, at public
sale, had been gratuitously restored to him by the purchaser,
on condition of his retaining it in his possession. His blindness
and inoccupation now broke the long silence to which
this instrument had been condemned, and afforded an accompaniment
to the young lady's voice.

Her chief employment was conversation. She resorted
to this as the best means of breaking the monotony of the
scene; but this purpose was not only accomplished, but other
benefits of the highest value accrued from it. The habits
of a painter eminently tended to vivify and make exact
her father's conceptions and delineations of visible objects.
The sphere of his youthful observation comprised more ingredients
of the picturesque, than any other sphere. The
most precious materials of the moral history of mankind, are
derived from the revolutions of Italy. Italian features and
landscape constitute the chosen field of the artist. No one
had more carefully explored this field than Mr. Dudley.
His time, when abroad, had been divided between residence
at Rome, and excursions to Calabria and Tuscany. Few
impressions were effaced from his capacious register, and
these were now rendered by his eloquence, nearly as conspicuous
to his companion as to himself.

She was imbued with an ardent thirst of knowledge, and
by the acuteness of her remarks, and the judiciousness of
her inquiries, reflected back upon his understanding as much
improvement as she received. These efforts to render his
calamity tolerable, and inure him to the profiting by his own
resources, were aided by time, and, when reconciled by
habit to unrespited gloom, he was, sometimes, visited by
gleams of cheerfulness, and drew advantageous comparisons
between his present and former situation. A stillness not unakin
to happiness, frequently diffused itself over their winter
evenings. Constantia enjoyed, in their full extent, the felicities
of health and self-approbation. The genius and eloquence
of her father, nourished by perpetual exercise, and
undiverted from its purpose by the intrusion of visible objects,
frequently afforded her a delight in comparison with which
all other pleasures were mean.

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