explains it all. This I will place in your hands; and when you have perused it I will rejoin you, and will willingly answer any farther questions you may have to propose." So saying, he unlocked a chest, whence he took a large book, delivered it to Reuben, and immediately quitted the cabin. Upon the cover of the volume, which was much discoloured by time and damp, was still faintly legible "Log-book of the Mermaid, Captain Brice." Nearly one-half of the leaves, those apparently which had related to the proceedings of the ship, had been torn out; and the remaining manuscript, in which Reuben, with an indescribable emotion, recognized the hand-writing of his father, had in many parts become so pale and indistinct, as not to be decyphered without difficulty. Repeatedly pressing the well-known characters to his lips, in a transport of tender reverence, he devoured, rather than perused, the following "NARRATIVE OF A SOLITARY. "Why should a wretch like me, condemned to everlasting solitude, cut off for ever from all communion with his fellow-creatures,-an exile, an outcast from all the social charities and sympathies of his species-one already as completely dead to the world, as if he were an inhabitant of another sphere,-why should such a being sit down to write the history of his miserable fate, and compose a record which can never be perused by human eye, but must inevitably moulder into dust beside the unburied bones of him who writes it ?-why? because I am a wretch—a lonely, forlorn, heart-stricken, hopeless wretch !-because, as there is no human ear into which I can pour my griefs, and never, never will be, I feel that my swelling heart would burst, did it not find a sad solace in venting its overflowing griefs upon paper;—and, lastly, because it was the wish of those departed saints, the loveliest, and most beloved of their sex, whose graves I dug with the same hand which is about to record their misfortunes, and beside whose burial-places I am now sitting, that I should leave some memorial of our fate. Wild, improbable, impossible as was the thought, they still clung to the hope that our friends in Europe, and, above all, my poor dear boy, might be relieved from the agony of suspense, and one day be made acquainted with our melancholy doom. My darling little Reuben! my son, my only child! I shall never see thee again! I shall never- -O that my life, my useless, joyless, lingering life, would flow from me as rapidly as the tears I am now shedding! "That passion of weeping has calmed me. I could not commence my mournful task without being overcome, without sinking under the fearful contrast of the past and the present; the happy retrospect of what I was, lifting up my heart like a beatific vision: the harrowing sense of what I am again withering it like a deadly blight. But I will be collected. I will endeavour not to think of my poor child-the only one now left to me. I will strive to subdue my feelings to my task, and detail my miseries with as much tranquillity as is consistent with the wretchedness of their nature, and the sometimes uncontrollable sensibility of the narrator. I will write, in short, as if my tragical story were at some future time to have a reader. If Reuben should ever-but no, it is impossible.-God Almighty bless thee! thou nestling of my heart-thou chosen one in whom I had much joy. Thou art an orphan now, although thy father is alive; and I childless, although my darling boy may be still existing. Farewell! farewell! "I have said that I would write a record of our misfortunes, and I must begin therefore with our departure from India. With what cheerful hearts we again turned our faces towards Europe, and felt that every breeze was wafting us nearer to the dear friends whom we had left in England, they only can imagine who have suffered the pangs of separation, and found themselves amid the strange and barbarous faces of another hemisphere, whose myriad inhabitants contain not one solitary friend, one sympathizing bosom, one fellow-creature in the smallest degree interested in their fate. Fortune continued for some time propitious to our voyage; the weather was fine, the wind was fair, and our temporary imprisonment was alle viated by the charms of society; for there were several families on board returning to Europe, elated, like ourselves, at the prospect of again embracing long absent relatives, and well disposed to pleasant fellowship by the expectation of a common happiness. Prosperous gales and smiling skies accompanied us, and contributed to the cheerfulness of the whole party, until, as I conjectured, we had nearly reached the latitude of the Cape of Good Hope. "After having employed myself one bright and sultry morning in calculating the probable profits of my shipment, which I found would secure to me a little independence, I consulted with my wife, and, with her entire consent, I called our daughter Agnes to us, and, after having apprised her of our flattering prospects, I continued: The purport of my voyage to India, my dear child, has been fully and happily accomplished in every respect. I have recovered the heavy debt, of which the loss once threatened me with ruin; the merchandize in which I have invested it promises an abundant return; and, what is infinitely more important - |