Amelia therefore broke open the letter, and read as follows:
'SIR,--After what hath passed between us, I need only tell you that I know you supped this very night alone with Miss Matthews: a fact which will upbraid you sufficiently, without putting me to that trouble, and will very well account for my desiring the favour of seeing you to- morrow in Hyde-park at six in the morning. You will forgive me reminding you once more how inexcusable this behaviour is in you, who are possessed in your own wife of the most inestimable jewel.
Yours,
T. JAMES.
I shall bring pistols with me.'
It is not easy to describe the agitation of Amelia's mind when she read this letter. She threw herself into her chair, turned as pale as death, began to tremble all over, and had just power enough left to tap the bottle of wine, which she had hitherto preserved entire for her husband, and to drink off a large bumper.
The little boy perceived the strange symptoms which appeared in his mother; and running to her, he cried, 'What's the matter, my dear mamma? you don't look well!--No harm hath happened to poor papa, I hope--Sure that bad man hath not carried him away again?'
Amelia answered, 'No, child, nothing--nothing at all.' And then a large shower of tears came to her assistance, which presently after produced the same in the eyes of both the children.
Amelia, after a short silence, looking tenderly at her children, cried out, 'It is too much, too much to bear. Why did I bring these little wretches into the world? why were these innocents born to such a fate?' She then threw her arms round them both (for they were before embracing her knees), and cried, 'O my children! my children! forgive me, my babes! Forgive me that I have brought you into such a world as this! You are undone--my children are undone!'
The little boy answered with great spirit, 'How undone, mamma? my sister and I don't care a farthing for being undone. Don't cry so upon our accounts--we are both very well; indeed we are. But do pray tell us. I am sure some accident hath happened to poor papa.'
'Mention him no more,' cries Amelia; 'your papa is--indeed he is a wicked man--he cares not for any of us. O Heavens! is this the happiness I promised myself this evening?' At which words she fell into an agony, holding both her children in her arms.
The maid of the house now entered the room, with a letter in her hand which she had received from a porter, whose arrival the reader will not wonder to have been unheard by Amelia in her present condition.
The maid, upon her entrance into the room, perceiving the situation of Amelia, cried out, 'Good Heavens! madam, what's the matter?' Upon which Amelia, who had a little recovered herself after the last violent vent of her passion, started up and cried, 'Nothing, Mrs. Susan--nothing extraordinary. I am subject to these fits sometimes; but I am very well now. Come, my dear children, I am very well again; indeed I am. You must now go to bed; Mrs. Susan will be so good as to put you to bed.'
'But why doth not papa love us?' cries the little boy. 'I am sure we have none of us done anything to disoblige him.'
This innocent question of the child so stung Amelia that she had the utmost difficulty to prevent a relapse. However, she took another dram of wine; for so it might be called to her, who was the most temperate of women, and never exceeded three glasses on any occasion. In this glass she drank her children's health, and soon after so well soothed and composed them that they went quietly away with Mrs. Susan.
The maid, in the shock she had conceived at the melancholy, indeed frightful scene, which had presented itself to her at her first coming into the room, had quite forgot the letter which she held in her hand. However, just at her departure she recollected it, and delivered it to Amelia, who was no sooner alone than she opened it, and read as follows:
'MY DEAREST, SWEETEST LOVE,--I write this from the bailiff's house where I was formerly, and to which I am again brought at the suit of that villain Trent. I have the misfortune to think I owe this accident (I mean that it happened to-night) to my own folly in endeavouring to
