portable pain. I am at last, in recompense for all my labours and crimes, dismissed from it with the disappointment of my only remaining hope the destruction of that for the sake of which alone I consented to exist. It was worthy of such a life that it should continue just long enough to witness this final overthrow. If, however, you wish to punish me, you must be speedy in your justice, for as reputation was the blood that warmed my heart, so I feel that death and infamy must seize me together.' I record the praises bestowed on me by Falkland, not because I deserve them but because they serve to aggravate the baseness of my cruelty. He survived but three days this dreadful scene. I have been his murderer. It was fit that he should praise my patience, who has fallen a victim, life and fame, to my precipitation! It would have been merciful in comparison if I had planted a dagger in his heart. He would have thanked me for my kindBut atrocious, execrable wretch that I have been! I wantonly inflicted on him an anguish a thousand times worse than death. Meanwhile I endure the penalty of my crime. His figure is ever in imagination before me. Waking or sleeping I still behold him. He seems mildly to expostulate with me for my unfeeling behaviour. I live the devoted victim of conscious reproach. Alas! I am the same Caleb Williams that, so short a time ago, boasted that, however great were the calamities I endured, I was still innocent. Such has been the result of a project I formed for delivering myself from the evils that had so long attended me. I thought that if Falkland were dead, I should return once again to all that makes life worth possessing. I though that, if the guilt of Falkland were established, fortune and the world would smile upon my efforts. Both these events are accomplished, and it is now only that I am truly miserable. Why should my reflections perpetually centre upon myself? self, an overwhelming regard to which has been the source of my errors! Falkland, I will think only of thee, and from that thought will draw ever-fresh nourishment for my sorrows! One generous, one disinterested tear I will consecrate to thy ashes! A nobler spirit lived not among the sons of men. Thy intellectual powers were truly sublime, and thy bosom burned with a godlike ambition. But of what use are talents and sentiments in the corrupt wilderness of human society? It is a rank and rotten soil from which every finer shrub draws poison as it grows. All that, in a happier field and a purer air, would expand into virtue and germinate into usefulness is thus converted into henbane and deadly nightshade. Falkland! thou enteredst upon thy career with the purest and most laudable intentions. But thou imbibedst the poison of chivalry with thy earliest youth; and the base and low-minded envy that met thee on thy return to thy native seats operated with this poison to hurry thee into madness. Soon, too soon, by this fatal coincidence, were the blooming hopes of thy youth blasted for ever! From that moment thou only continuedst to live to the phantom of departed honour. From that moment thy benevolence was, in a great part, turned into rankling jealousy and inexorable precaution. Year after year didst thou spend in this miserable project of imposture; and only at last continuedst to live long enough to see, by my misjudging and abhorred intervention, thy closing hope disappointed, and thy death accompanied with the foulest disgrace! I began these memoirs with the idea of vindicating my character. I have now no character that I wish to vindicate; but I will finish them that thy story may be fully understood; and that, if those errors of thy life be known which thou so ardently desiredst to conceal, the world may at least not hear and repeat a half-told and mangled tale. INDEX Alfonso the Good, former possessor benefactor, introduced, 305- 584; tells Emily about veiled Anville, Evelina's assumed sur- name, 452, 454, etc. See Eve- d'Arblay, Mme. See Burney, Fanny broke's Arcadia "), introd., VII, Arthur, King, 1; chosen king, 2-6; Barlow, parish clergyman, teaches Behn, Mrs. Aphra, introd., IX; Belford, John, Lovelace's friend and recipient of most of his Bernard of Astolat, Elaine's father, Betty, maid in Harlowe family, Bianca, Matilda's maid, 504, 505, Black George, Allworthy's game- Blanche, daughter of Count de Blifil, Master, Allworthy's nephew, INDEX 340; plays part in bird incident, See Allworthy, Miss Bobby, Master, Tristram Shandy's Bors, Arthurian knight, in quest Camelot, 29, 34; visits Launce- Bunyan, John, introd., IX; 128–159 "Caleb Williams." See "Things Castle of Otranto," introd., XII; 64 Clarissa Harlowe, scorns Solmes, of Conrad, son of Manfred of Otranto, Curio, suitor to Lucilla, 83-84, 85, 87 Daiphantus. See Pyrocles, 94 |