uniting our hearts more closely; and the happiness of a marriage where love only prefided was perhaps too great for humanity; for thofe halcyon days were greatly obfcured by the increasing illness of f my mother, who declined rapidly for almost a fortnight, and then died in the arms of Montgomery, commending, with her last breath, her two boys to his protection. Her death, which, long as I expected it, appeared utterly infupport able now it arrived, threw me into a state of languor and dejection, from which I was fuddenly roufed by hearing that Lord Pevensey, who had quitted France immediately after his disgraceful difmiffion from the houfe, was now returned, and, enraged to find that Montgomery was actually my husband, had determined to purfue, with all the eagerness rage and hatred could inspire, the process by which he hoped to deprive me and my brothers of our legacies. Nor was this all; the perfonal affront which he had received from Montgomery he could not bear, though he had deferved it; and he now sent him a challenge, which Montgomery readily accepted; but to evade the strictnefs of thofe laws which are in force in France againft duelling, the place where they were to meet was fixed in the dominions of the Pope, a little beyond Avignon. Montgomery, anxious only to conceal this from me, found a pretence for his journey; and telling me he had some military bulinefs to tranfact at Marfeilles, which would detain him for fome days, he parted from me, concealing with courage truly heroic the auguifh he felt in knowing that we were perhaps to meet

no more.

Providence yet preferved him to me. He dangerously wounded his adversary; and returned himself in fafety. Then he related the cause of his abfence; and the happiness I felt at his fafety was augmented, when a few days afterwards we received from Lord Pevenfey, who believed himself dying, and was vifited with the reproaches of a troubled confcience, an acknowledgement of the juftice of my brothers claims to the provifion made for them by their father, and an order to his procureur at Paris to put an end to every fuit depending against us. In a few months Lord Pevenfey recovered; we were put in poffeffion of our rights; and my beloved Montgomery, to whom I owed every thing, ftudied not only how to make me happy, but to purfue as

near as poffible that line of conduct which my mother would have done had fhe lived. A war was raging with great violence between France and England, and I was unwilling to fend the two dear boys to a country where it would be now difficult for me to fee them. But as I knew it was the defire of my mother and my benefactor to have them brought up in the Proteftant religion, I fent them with their tutor to Geneva. I had hardly recovered the pain of this parting, before one much more grievous was inflicted. The regiment in which Montgomery had a company, was ordered into Germany. The fituation I was then in made it seem madness to think of following him; but I was convinced that I fhould not furvive his departure. He was to me, father, brother, lover, husband! I had no other earthly happiness; and without him the univerfe was to me nothing. At firft his fears for my fafety made him refift my importunities; but he was compelled at length to confent, and I followed him, refiding wherever he was incamped; and, however horrid the fcenes were to which I thus became a witness, I feared nothing but for his life; that one dreadful apprehenfion having the effect of all violent paffions, and making me forego, without miffing them, every convenience to which I had been accustomed, and meet without apprehenfion a thousand dangers to which I was hourly expofed.

In a small village on the banks of the Wefer, near the camp of Mareschal de Contades, my dear Charles was born, towards the beginning of the campaign of 1759. But he had not above fix weeks blessed my eyes, and those of his doating father, before that dear father went out to the fatal field of Minden. I cannot defcribe what I felt during the action. My faculties were fufpended by the most dreadful apprehenfions that could agonize the human heart; this frightful suspense was terminated only by the certainty ofall I dreaded. The English were victors; and the fervant who had long attended on Montgomery had only time to tell me that he fell at the head of his company, his arm broken by a mufket fhot, and receiving a thruft from a bayonet in the breaft. The man added, that, with a party of soldiers who adored their captain, he had attempted to bring his mafter off the field; but that they were cut down by a body of Hef

fian horse, who, driving every thing before them, had compelled him to abandon the enterprize. I believe that my fenfes for fome hours forfook me, during the horrors of a night too terrible to be defcribed; the English took poffeffion of the village where I was; but, fortunately for me, a young officer of that nation was the firft who, in endeavouring to prevent the exceffes of the troops, entered the house where I remained with my infant in my arms.

Roufed by my fears for my child, I feemed fuddenly to acquire courage. I demanded protection of the young officer, which, with the generous ardour of the truly brave, he inftantly granted me; and being himself compelled to quit me, he gave me a corporal's guard, recommended me to the men as an English woman; and, having secured my fafety, promised to return to me when the confufion of the hour a little fubfided. The ftupor of my grief being thus fhaken off for a moment, I recollected, that if I suffered myself to fink, my boy, deprived of the nourishment which fuftained him, would perifh miferably. I took therefore the fuftenance my fervants offered me, but I neither spoke nor fhed tears, nor heeded any thing that was faid to me: my mind dwelling on the plan I had formed to avail myfelf of the generofity of the English officer, and to engage him to affift me in finding Montgomery, whether living or dead. It was late before this gallant young man returned to me: the moment he entered, he enquired eagerly after my health and safety. I thanked him as well as I could for the prefervation I owed to him: but added, that to give it higher value, he muft yet add another favour, and enable me to find the body of my husband, who had fallen in the field.

He seemed amazed at my defign; and reprefented to me, that befides the tervi fying circumftances attendant on fuch an undertaking, fo unfit for my age and fex to encounter, my endeavours would very probably be fruitlefs." Nor fhould you, Madam, "added he, "fo implicitly yield to grief: he, whofe death you lament as certain, may be a prisoner."

This ray of probability would have cheered for a moment the blackness of my despair, had not the particulars related by Montgomery's fervant left me nothing to hope. I related thefe circumtances to the English officer, with that

gloomy defperation which precludes the power of thedding tears. He saw the ftate of my mind, and generously refolved not only to gratify me, but himself to protect me with a party of his men.

With my little boy in my arms (for I refufed to leave him as obftinately as to relinquish my project), I went forth on this dreadful errand, to a scene of death and desolation so terrible, that I will not fhock you by an attempt to paint it: livid bodies covered with ghaftly wounds, from whom the wretches who follow camps, making war more hideous, were yet ftripping their bloody garments; heaps of human beings thus butchered by the hands of their fellow-creatures, affected me with fuch a fenfation of fick horror, that I was frequently on the point of fainting. But Montgomery among them! left to be the food of wolves or dogs-that beloved face, that form on which my eyes had fo doated, disfigured and mangled by birds of prey!. This horrid image renewed from time to time my exhaufted ftrength; and the pity of my noble conductor, more and more excited in my favour, fuffered him not to tire in the mournful office of attending me,

We had however traversed in vain so much of the bloody field that my search feemed to be at length defperate; and my protector entreated me to confider, that by a longer perfeverance I should injure my own health, and perhaps detroy my child, without a poffibility of being of the leaft ufe to the loft object of my affection. It was now indeed night; but the moon fhone with great luftre : and juft as he had agreed to indulge me with ten minutes longer, on condition that I would then defift, the rays of the moon fell on fomething white a few yards from me, which glittered extremely. An impulfe, for which I cannot now account, made me fuddenly catch it up; it was part of the sleeve of a shirt, and in it was a button fet with brilliants, that had once belonged to Lord Pevenfey, and which, as the diamonds furrounded a cypher formed of her hair, had been, after his Lordship's death, given by my mother to Montgomery.

This well known memorial convinced me of one fatal truth-that Montgomery was among the dead; but it revived the wretched hope of finding his body, which I imagined could not be far off. My conductor allowed that it was probable, and

I

accounted

accounted for this remnant of his fhirt being found, by fuppofing that it had been torn, and dropped in a dispute for the spoil, which had happened among the plunderers of the deceased.

Animated by this melancholy certainty, I more narrowly examined every ghaftly countenance near the spot; and at length, half concealed by the blood that had flowed from his arm, which was thrown acrofs his face, I discovered those well known features fo dear to my agonized heart.

Then, that grief which had hitherto been filent and fullen, fufpended perhaps by a latent hope of his being a prifoner, broke forth in cries and lamentations. I threw myself on the ground; fpoke to Montgomery, as if he was yet capable of hearing me, and, in the wildness of my phrenzy, protefted that I would never remove from the spot where he lay, but would remain there, and perish with my infant, by the fide of my husband. The young officer, with all that humanity which characterizes the truly brave of every nation, bore with my extravagance; and with the moft patient pity attempted to foothe and appeafe me, by calling off my thoughts from the dead, to whom I could be no longer ferviceable, and fixing them en my child, to whom my existence was fo neceffary: but a new idea had now struck me-I insisted upon it, that Montgomery was not dead; that I felt his heart palpitate; and that if I remained there and watched by him, he would recover. I laid my hand clofe to his mouth; fancied that, though feebly, he ftill breathed. My generous friend, who imputed all I faid to the delirium of extravagant forrow, yet condefcended to humour, in hopes of affuaging it; but when, in compliance with my earnest entreaty, he enquired into the reality of my hopes, be fancied, with mingled atonishment and pleafure, that he really found a flight pulfe in the heart, and that the body had not the clayey coldness of death. Fearful, however, of indul ging me in a hope, which, if found fallacious, might drive me into madness, be only faid, that though he thought it smprobable that any life remained, yet that to fatisfy me the body should be removed to the house where I lodged, where a furgeon fhould attend to examine it; and if, as he greatly feared, there was indeed no chance of the vital powers being resuimated, I thould at least be gratified in

feeing the laft offices performed; and fhould as long as I remained where I was left, receive, both in regard to executing that mournful duty, and to my own fafety, every good office he could render me.

The guard, which he had directed to follow us through the field, now approached on his fignal; they were directed to raise the body he pointed out; and to carry it to the village from whence we came. Fatigue and terror were now equally unfelt; for though I had been too much agitated to difcern those symp toms of life which my protector had really found, and had merely afferted it as an excuse to remain by the body of my husband, I was now fure that I fhould be indulged in my grief, and that Montgomery would receive the rites of sepul. ture. The body was no fooner placed on a bed in the room I inhabited, than throwing among the foldiers my purse, unfeen by their commander, I haftened to give myself up to the dreadful luxu. ry of forrow. I found the young Eng. lifhman already there, gazing atten tively on the disfigured face, with looks rather of doubt than of defpair. On my entrance he retired, faying, "Though I would not have you, Madam, too fanguine in encouraging hopes which will make a painful uncertainty doubly cruel, yet I cannot wholly discourage them: that wound on the head, which feems to have been done by the hoof of an horfe, gives me the most apprehension, for the reft appear not to have been mortal; but the furgeon, who shall attend you the moment he can be fpared from his duty, will be better able than I am to tell you whether you have really any reason to flatter yourself."

Before the furgeon arrived, I had, with the affiftance of the French maid who attended me, washed the blood from the face, and from the various wounds he had received. The ideas which had occurred only in the ravings of a distempered imagination now became real hopes: a flight pulfation appeared in the artery of the temples; his heart certainly, though languidly, beat. Ah! imagine my tranfports, for words cannot paint them; imagine what I felt when the furgeon, who foon after arri ved, declared that Montgomery was not dead. Far, however, was he from pronouncing that he would recover. Befides the fracture in his arm, which was

a

a very bad one; a wound made by a bayonet in the breaft, which was not very deep; and a violent wound on the head, where however the skull had efcaped; he had loft fo much blood, that it was almoft impoffible to fuppofe he could survive it; and his weakness was fo exceffive, that he remained wholly infenfible, fupported only by drops of nourish ment which I conveyed into his mouth with a fpoon; and the furgeon dared not proceed immediately to the neceffary operation of fetting his arm, left the fhock fhould difmifs the feeble fpirit, which seemed every moment ready to depart from its mangled abode.

Let me be brief in an account which I fee has affected you too much.-At the end of a week, Montgomery, reftored from the grafp of death, recovered his recollection, and knew me and his boy; and as the furgeons could not conve niently attend him where he was, my generous friend had him removed, as foon as it was poffible, into Minden, now in poffeffion of the English. There, at the end of a month, he was out of danger; but yet confined to his bed: and, there at the termination of that period, he parted from his noble preferver (for whom he felt all the friendfhip his generofity and perfonal merit deferved), as he was then ordered to another part of Germany, and foon after returned to England. Before he went, he affifted Montgomery to procure his exchange; which was attended with fome difficulty, because there were doubts of his being a British fubject. Having how ever, by the inftruction of this excellent friend, procured fufficient teftimony of his being, though the son of Scottish parents, a fubject of the French King's, his exchange as fuch was ad mitted, and at the end of five months we returned to Paris. But Montgome. ry returned a cripple; for his arm, which had been with difficulty, and only by the extraordinary fkill of the English furgeon, faved from amputation, was rendered wholly ufelefs, and he wore it always in a fling. The extra ordinary circumftance of his efcape from death, as well as his great military merit, procured him the notice of the King of France; who gave him, with a penfion confiderable at that time and in that fervice, the crofs of St Louis.

It was now that I reasonably hoped for fome portion of happiness. Adoring VOL. LII.

Montgomery; having been the fortunate inftrument in the hands of Providence to rescue him from death; with a lovely boy on whom we both doated, and a fortune equal to our wants, (for, with what arofe from the intereft of Lord Pevenfey's gift to me, and his penfion, we had near four hundred pounds ayear), I feemed to have nothing left to with for; and fome years did indeed pafs, during which my felicity could hardly admit of increafe. The early promife of merit which Charles's infancy gave, every year feemed to confirm : it was the principal pride and pleasure of his father to be his inftructor in every liberal science, as well as in tactics; for, born in a camp, he seemed a predef tined foldier. Though brought up himfelf in the Catholic religion, Montgomery was fo little of a bigot, that be suffered me to educate my fon a Proteftant; and that circumftance only had prevented his early entrance into the French army. Measures, however, were taking to procure him a commiffion among the Swifs in that fervice, when a violent and fudden illness deprived him of his parent and protector, and me of the most beloved of husbands, and the tenderest of friends.

Pardon me, my deareft Mifs Chefterville! Though I have long been familiar with forrow; though almost five years have paffed fince this lamented event; I cannot always conquer thefe unavailing tears. But wherefore fhould I diftrefs you? I have only to add, that at the death of my husband great part of our income ceafed; and, though I folicited a continuance of at leaft part of his penfion, I found that under a new reign his fervices had been fuperfeded by newer claims. So many difficulties arofe, and fo uncertain feemed my fuccefs, that, after an expenfive application at Paris and Versailles for fome months, I gave up all hope, and determined to go to England; which, notwithstanding my long feparation from it, I ftill confidered as my country.

On my arrival in London with my fon, I made my felf known to fome of my own and of Montgomery's relations, who were established in employments about the court; and they, having understood my fituation, promifed that they would immediately apply for a commiffion for my fon in the army, where I was compelled to fuffer him to be placed, not only because his own inPP

clinations