THE DEATH OF CLARISSA.* [Clarissa Harlowe has been deceived by Lovelace. On her deathbed she is visited by her cousin, Colonel Morden. The scene is described in three letters from Belford to Lovelace.+] M RS Smith stept up and brought us down word, that Mrs Lovick and her nurse were with her; and that she was in so sound a sleep, leaning upon the former in her elbow-chair, that she neither heard her enter the room, nor go out. The colonel begged, if not improper, that he might see her, though sleeping. He said, that his impatience would not let him stay till she awaked. Yet he would not have her disturbed, and should be glad to contemplate her sweet features when she saw not him; and asked, if she thought he could not go in, and come out, without disturbing her. She believed he might, she answered; for her chair's back was towards the door. He said he would take care to withdraw, if she awoke, that his sudden appearance might not surprise her. Mrs Smith, stepping up before us, bid Mrs Lovick and the nurse not stir, when we entered; and then we went up softly together. We beheld the lady, in a charming attitude. Dressed, as I told you before, in her virgin white, she was sitting in her elbow-chair, Mrs Lovick close by her, in another chair, with her left arm round her neck, supporting it as it were; for it seems, the lady had bid her do so, saying she had been a mother to her, and she would delight herself in thinking she was in her mamma's arms; for she found herself drowsy,-perhaps, she said, for the last time she should ever be so. One faded cheek rested upon the good woman's bosom, the kindly warmth of which had overspread it with a faint, but charming blush; the other paler, and hollow, as if already iced over by death. Her hands white as the lily, with her meandering veins more transparently blue than ever * From "Clarissa, or the History of a Young Lady," in 7 vols. 1748. |