LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 561, 5 April 1876, Page 3

LITERATURE.

THOE LEIGH MOAT. A Grandmother’s Tale. Scene: A drawing-room in a country house. Personages : The Grandmother {speaking), the Grandchildren (mute). ( Concluded .) I shrank from mentioning the apparation to any one, and never made the slightest effort to approach it. It seemed as if to do either would break the spell, and that I should behold it no more. All day I wandered in the desolate woods and gardens, longing for night to come, when I should seek the chapel and watch for that transient glimpse of, as I felt sure, the spirit world. This lasted some time. Every night I beheld the unearthly visitant, and every night I sought my couch more and more weaned from thoughts of earth, and believing more and more firmly that I saw a messenger from my lost lover, and only determined to wait patiently his pleasure that his wishes should be communicated. As the month wore on the moon, nearly at full, gave a clearer light. It fell full upon the stairs, though still leaving the highest and lowest steps in shadow; and as the figure emerged into the r> splendence I could trace every fold of the long garments, which almost cove ed the hands and feet, and even the head, leaving only the face uncovered, and that had never yet been turned towards me—never yet. 0, that it never had been ! But one night, as the moon at full shone more brilliantly than ever, my feelings became uncontrolled. I started forward ; the figure turned, and, 0 God ! it was my lover’s face ! I saw it, changed as by the grave, pallid and ghastly, with eyes that seemed to glare upon me with hatred and fury; but it was his face, and, whether in body or spirit, that was enough for me. I flew to him, uttering his name with frantic cries, with shrieks of mingled joy and fear. The figure fled, the door seemed to yield before it, and as I followed I saw the flutter of light-coloured garments disappear through an opening on the other side of the belfry chamber—then a heavy fall, a fearful cry, a splash in the deep waters of the moat, and all was still. I sank insensible upon the floor. * * * * * Go on. Tell you how it all happened. I wiil—although the truth is almost too sad and shocking for your young ears. My beloved, my lover, my beautiful Osmund—the favourite, as he seemed of Nature and of Fortune—had been from his childhood subject to fits of insanity. His doting mother had always concealed the melancholy fact as far as possible; and as he grew older, and the attacks became less frequent, she fondly hoped that in time they would cease altogether. At the time of my arrival he had been so afflicted; but as the fit had been slight and of short duration, his mother hoped his love for me, which seemed to effect a change in his whole nature, would complete the cure. My uncle had consented reluctantly to what he considered a sacrifice, but she overruled him, and insisted upon his silence. How I should have felt towards him had I known it before we met, I cannot tell; but certainly, after I once loved him, the knowledge of his calamity would but have increased my affection. Just before the time fixed for our marriage a sudden attack, of a worse nature than any that had preceded it, came on, probably caused by the excitement which his mother had, hoped would operate so differently. He had never been sent away from home on these occasions, but always kept under the charge of competent persons in a secluded portion of the building, still under his mother’s watchful eye, and on recovery he always seemed quite unconscious of the state he had been in. All these particulars I learned later. How he contrived on those fatal nights to elude the vigilance of the guardians, I never quite understood ; but madness is cunning, and doubtless his wandering mind clung to the remembrances of the spot. His horror and flight at sight of me may be only too well accounted for—the insane generally detesting those they most love in their lucid moments. But to return. Next morning I was found insensible upon the belfry stairs, and some trace of his garments floating on the waters of the moat guided the searchers to the discovery of Osmund’s corpse. A brain fever long confined me to my bed, and when at last I woke to consciousness my aunt was dead. The shock had overwhelmed her, and she did not long survive her hapless son. My uncle was bowed down with grief and remorse for the part he had played in this sad tragedy —passive though it was—and it was to console him that I first roused myself to take a part in the ordinary affairs of life. I need not say w r e left Thorleigh Moat, which has ever since been shut up and neglected, and took refuge on a small estate belonging to my uncle in the same county, but at some distance off. And now I think that all is told. Ah ! you want to hear something about the kind grandfather you ■>ll remember : my dears, your grandfather, Sir Henry Moreton, was the young baronet mentioned at the bginning of my story. And now good night. God bless you, dears, and all to bed.