for the sake of his father's name, and his mother, who yet lived, he would not die without raising his voice to declare, before God, that he died innocent of blood-that in the madness of torture and agony he had confessed to utter falsehoods merely to procure ease, for which he implored Heaven to pardon him! Then he prayed in silence, and waited for the death-blow. His poor mother pined daily. She could not be prevailed upon to stir into the open air; and if she had now been seen as of old, gliding along the ramparts, few would have recognised in her wasted features the young Widow of Bremen. There was another sad page in this unhappy story. She received a parcel from Jena, which contained a small box, and a letter from Franz Meyer, the Greek professor. His daughter Sophia was dead; her last care had been to make up this little pacquet-her last request that he would send it when she died, to Mary Von Korper. It contained young Hermann's portrait, and a note from poor Sophia. She said that she sent her lover's picture to the only one now on earth who knew how to love them; and that she prayed, with her parting breath, that Heaven might bring her to join them, where his innocence would be known to all, as it was now known to them alone. It was many years before Mary Von Korper crossed her threshold. At last I prevailed on her to walk slowly about the neighbourhood of her house. She seemed slowly sinking into the grave; and her physician told her that exercise was her only chance of life. One morning she expressed a wish to cross some fields at the back of her house, where there was a seat, in a beautiful little woodland, of which she used to be fond. We proceeded onwards; as we slowly passed the corner of this wall here, where the fatal scuffle between Hermann and young Brauer had taken place so long before, I saw an officer-standing on this very spot, his arms folded, looking towards us. Mary was then leaning on me, holding her face down; and just before she lifted her head to speak to me, I was shocked to feel how light was her emaciated frame, though I was then bearing her whole weight. As she raised and turned her head, her eyes fell full on the stranger's features: she gave him one wild earnest look, shrieked, and sunk lifeless in my arms. The stranger sprang forwards to hold her. "Lay her on the grass," said he, "she has only fainted; run to the house for water, and I will support her." When I came back she was sitting on the grass, leaning on the stranger, whom she introduced to me as Ernest Von Harstenleit, a friend of her early days, whom she had not seen for a long-long time; the sudden meeting, she said, had been too great a shock for her weak frame. I begged her to let us take her home, that she might rest, and quiet her fevered nerves. We proceeded thither-the stranger and I supporting her between us. When we entered she appeared unable to bear up a moment longer, and called, faintingly, for water. Old Muller, who had watched her return with much anxiety, came himself to attend on her. She looked wildly but significantly at him, and then at me-pointed to the stranger, and gasped out rather than spoke-" Seize him! He is Adolphe; Adolphe, for whom my boy was murdered!" She fainted as the words left her lips, and we were running towards her, when a quick movement of the stranger warned us not to let him escape. The undefined feeling which had made me gaze so earnestly upon him was fully explained. He was, indeed, Adolphe Brauer, for whose supposed murder, my poor young friend had been executed! The conspiracy to procure the death of young Hermann, by this false accusation, was clearly brought home to him, and he was executed for it: but the accomplice, who had appeared as his father, escaped detection. The poor widow only survived for a few days the shock of this sudden discovery; and from his confession, and her disclosure to me, just before her death, the tissue of this strange and mournful story was made complete. Ernest Von Harstenleit was the Bavarian officer, of whom mention was made in the beginning of my story. Mary confessed that her husband's suspicions were not groundless. During his absence, her heart had been won by the stranger, and when he returned, she had forgotten her duty, and was in Ernest's power. Her husband's fury drove Von Harstenleit ignominiously from the town; and he fled, no one knew whither. During his absence, it appeared, by his own confesssion, that the wretch had employed a woman, since but too notorious throughout Germany, who entered Von Korper's service as cook, merely to poison him. It was long ere the officer ventured again on the scene; but, in his new character of steward, he soon regained his ascendancy over the widow, who had no suspicion of his agency in her husband's death. Indeed, I suspect, he was the only man she ever really loved. The fury of young Hermann, who discovered their attachment, drove away the disguised steward; and the scene that ensued, happened just as poor Hermann had confessed, save in the catastrophe. Burning with hatred, Adolphe fled wounded, and without his hat, which had been struck off in the struggle. He resumed the military dress which he had worn previous to his assuming the disguise of a steward, and Adolphe Brauer was now no more. With the malice of a fiend, Ernest devised the plot, which by the aid of a suborned villain, brought poor Hermann to the scaffold. He would have remained undetected, had he not madly thought Mary's love would follow him through every depth of crime. No eye but hers could recognize him, and on her he relied undoubtingly. But though the sanctuary of her affections had been polluted-though even to the last her love remained, and the struggle killed her, Mary Von Korper shrank with horror from the asssassin of her son. To clear his memory, she gave up her guilty love; but it was twined in the very heartstrings of her life, and she survived not the sacrifice. This is the spot (said the poor man, turning to the travellers) were the murder was alleged to have been committed; and here Mary begged me with her last breath to put up this tablet, that the stranger might learn, and the inhabitant never forget, that this history is mournfully true, and no idle legend. HISTORICAL ACCURACY. Ricaut, in his History of the Turks, says "that they so confound chronology and history, as to assert that Job was a judge in the court of King Solomon, and Alexander the Great one of his generals." HOME. Cling to thy home, if there the meanest shed TO. MRS ANNE ROLFE. The voice of Rachel for her children weeping O mournful mother, lonely vigil keeping Spread forth, like Rizpah's veil, thy woe to heav'n, The young! the beautiful! the lov'd! the gifted! And from thy harp, a wand'ring wind hath drifted Which dulls the vivifying meteur fire, Playing around mine own untutor'd lyre. For damp as vapour from the tomb exhaling, Comes that cold, blighting strain, of love and wailing Yet think, are not those young, transcendent men, Think, fondest mother, and in holy dreaming Think, how thou 'rt blest, thy highest wish esteeming, Who've liv'd, with all their brilliant gifts and pow'rs, To honourable age, in briefest hours! * See page 52. Think,-favoured mother! what had been thy feelings For each dear youth, If, with maternal care, the path revealing The absent, and the sleeping, had astray Think, lady, of thine anguish, if eschewing Thy sons had madly rush'd to their undoing, But thou, that gall-draught of maternal woe How many hearts parental now are bleeding, Whilst thou, CORNELIA, joy may'st find exceeding Who have been, are, and shall be "jewels" yet, Then, blessed matron, teach thy harp of plaining He, whose young moonlight life, was but, when waning, With him, whose absence wounds thee,-not in vain, Bring snow-drops pure, bring violets just peeping, After long months of hopeless deathlike sleeping, And plant upon the grave of holy youth To him, on Ind's scorch'd plains, of ills unheeding, Send meek Forget me nots, whose silent pleading O, should he fade, hint with cerulean ray |