engraved on his remembrance. The young Countess, whose tender
heart could not bear the shock of such a spectacle, retired to the coach
with Madam Clement and the Jew, while Renaldo, accompanied by the rest,
entered a dismal apartment, altogether void of furniture and convenience,
where they beheld the wretched hero of these memoirs stretched almost
naked upon straw, insensible, convulsed, and seemingly in the grasp of
death. He was worn to the bone either by famine or distemper; his face
was overshadowed with hair and filth; his eyes were sunk, glazed, and
distorted; his nostrils dilated; his lips covered with a black slough;
and his complexion faded into a pale clay-colour, tending to a yellow
hue. In a word, the extremity of indigence, squalor, and distress could
not be more feelingly represented.

While Melvil perused this melancholy lesson, and groaning, cried, "Behold
the fate of man!" he perceived a letter in the right hand of the
unfortunate Fathom, which lay fast clenched across his breast. Curious
to know the contents of this paper, which the young woman said he had
kept in that position for several days, he drew nearer the wretched
couch, and was not a little surprised to see it addressed to the Right
Honourable Renaldo Count de Melvil, to the care of Mr. Joshua Manesseh,
merchant in London. When he attempted to disengage this billet from the
author's hand, the sorrowing female fell upon her knees, entreating him
to desist, and telling him, she had promised, upon oath, to communicate
the contents to no person upon earth, but to carry the letter, upon her
husband's decease, to the gentleman to whose care it was directed.

Renaldo assured her, upon his honour, that he was the very Renaldo Count
de Melvil, for whom it was intended; and the young creature was so much
confounded at this information, that, before she could recollect herself,
Melvil had opened the billet, and read these words: "If this paper should
fall into the hands of the noble Renaldo, he will understand, that Fathom
was the most execrable traitor that ever imposed upon unsuspecting
benevolence, or attempted to betray a generous benefactor. His whole
life was a series of fraud, perfidy, and the most abominable ingratitude.
But, of all the crimes that lay heavy upon his soul, his being accessory
to the death of the incomparable Serafina, whose father he had also
robbed, was that for which he despaired of Heaven's forgiveness,
notwithstandin