s, where we recovered him with some difficulty. He made an effort to
return to the seashore; but, having conjured him not to renew his own
anguish and ours by those cruel remembrances, he took another direction.
During eight days he sought every spot where he had once wandered with the
companion of his childhood. He traced the path by which she had gone to
intercede for the slave of the Black River. He gazed again upon the banks
of the Three Peaks, where she had reposed herself when unable to walk
further, and upon that part of the wood where they lost their way. All
those haunts, which recalled the inquietudes, the sports, the repasts, the
benevolence of her he loved, the river of the Sloping Mountain, my house,
the neighbouring cascade, the papaw tree she had planted, the mossy downs
where she loved to run, the openings of the forest where she used to sing,
called forth successively the tears of hopeless passion; and those very
echoes which had so often resounded their mutual shouts of joy, now only
repeated those accents of despair, 'Virginia! Oh, my dear Virginia!'

"While he led this savage and wandering life, his eyes became sunk and
hollow, his skin assumed a yellow tint, and his health rapidly decayed.
Convinced that present sufferings are rendered more acute by the bitter
recollection of past pleasures, and that the passions gather strength in
solitude, I resolved to tear my unfortunate friend from those scenes which
recalled the remembrance of his loss, and to lead him to a more busy part
of the island. With this view, I conducted him to the inhabited heights of
Williams, which he had never visited, and where agriculture and commerce
ever occasioned much bustle and variety. A crowd of carpenters were
employed in hewing down the trees, while others were sawing planks.
Carriages were passing and repassing on the roads. Numerous herds of oxen
and troops of horses were feeding on those ample meadows, over which a
number of habitations were scattered. On many spots the elevation of the
soil was favourable to the culture of European trees: ripe corn waved its
yellow sheaves upon the plains: strawberry plants flourished in the
openings of the woods, and hedges of rose bushes along the roads. The
freshness of the air, by giving a tension to the nerves, was favourable to
the Europeans. From those heights, situated near the middle of the island,
and surrounded by extensive forests, you could neither discern Port Louis,
th