santhropy, and suicide--the month
during which Heaven receives a scantier tribute of gratitude from
discontented man--during which the sun rises, but shines not--gives
forth an unwilling light, but glads us not with his cheerful rays--
during which large tallow candles assist the merchant to calculate his
gains or to philosophise over his losses--in short, it was one evening
in the month of November of the year 17---, that Edward Forster, who had
served many years in his Majesty's navy, was seated in a snug arm-chair,
in a snug parlour, in a snug cottage to which he had retired upon his
half-pay, in consequence of a severe wound which had, for many years,
healed but to break out again each succeeding spring.

The locality of the cottage was not exactly so snug as it has been
described in itself, and its interior; for it was situated on a hill
which terminated at a short distance in a precipitous clift, beetling
over that portion of the Atlantic which lashes the shores of Cumberland
under the sub-denomination of the Irish Sea. But Forster had been all
his early life a sailor, and still felt the same pleasure in listening
to the moaning and whistling of the wind, as it rattled the shutters of
his cottage (like some importunate who would gain admittance), as he
used to experience when, lying in his hammock, he was awakened by the
howling of the blast, and shrouding himself in his blankets to resume
his nap, rejoiced that he was not exposed to its fury.

His finances did not allow him to indulge in luxuries, and the
distillation of the country was substituted for wine. With his feet
upon the fender, and his glass of whisky-toddy at his side, he had been
led into a train of thought by the book which he had been reading; some
passage of which had recalled to his memory scenes that had long passed
away--the scenes of youth and hope--the happy castle-building of the
fresh in heart, invariably overthrown by time and disappointment. The
night was tempestuous; the rain now pattered loud, then ceased as if it
had fed the wind, which renewed its violence, and forced its way through
every crevice. The carpet of his little room occasionally rose from the
floor, swelled up by the insidious entrance of the searching blast; the
solitary candle, which from neglect had not only elongated its wick to
an unusual extent, but had formed a sort of mushroom top, was every
moment in danger of extinction, while the chintz curtains of the windo