ith a bosom bursting with
anguish, Alonzo paid for his ale without drinking it, bade her good
night, and slowly proceeded to the church-yard. The moon, in full
lustre, shone with solemn, silvery ray, on the sacred piles, and funeral
monuments of the sacred dead; the wind murmured mournfully among the
weeping willows; a solitary nightingale[A] sang plaintively in the
distant forest; and a whippoorwill, Melissa's favourite bird, whistled
near the portico of the church. The large white tomb-stones soon caught
the eye of Alonzo. He approached them with tremulous step, and with
feelings too agitated for description. On the head-stone he read as
follows:

SACRED
To the Memory of inestimable departed
WORTH;
To unrivalled Excellence and Virtue.
Miss MELISSA D----,
Whose remains are deposited here, and
whose ethereal part became a seraph,
October 26, 1776,
In the 18th year of her age.

[Footnote A: This bird, though not an inhabitant of the northern
states, is frequently to be met with in Georgia and the Carolinas.]

Alonzo bent, kneeled, he prostrated himself, he clasped the green turf
which enclosed her grave, he watered it with his tears, he warmed it
with his sighs. "Where art thou, bright beam of heavenly light! he said.
Come to my troubled soul, blessed spirit! Come, holy shade! come in all
thy native loveliness, and cheer the bosom of wretchedness, by thy grief
dispersing smile! On the ray of yon evening star descend. One moment
leave the celestial regions of glory--leave, one moment, thy sister
beatitudes, and glide, in entrancing beauty, before me: wave, benignly
wave thy white hand, and assuage the anguish of despairing sorrow! Alas!
in vain my invocation! A curtain, impenetrable, is drawn betwixt me and
thee, only to be disclosed by the dissolution of nature."

He arose and walked away: suddenly he stopped. "Yet, said he, if spirits
departed lose not the power of recollection;--if they have knowledge of
present events on earth, Melissa cannot have forgotten me--she must pity
me." He returned to the grave; he took her miniature from his bosom;
he held it up, and earnestly viewed it by the moon's pale ray.

"Ah, Franklin! he exclaimed, how tenderly does she beam her lovely eye
upon me! How often have I drank delicious extacy from the delicacy of
those unrivalled charms! How often have they taught me to a