The morning sun rose dimly in a bank of clouds. It found Charles still clinging to the remains of poor Aloysia, and bathing with kisses and tears the stiffened features of her beloved sister. With a silken kerchief she had bandaged the fatal gash on her neck, believing she might be only in a swoon and might recover. Hope, which is the last comfort to abandon man in his most desperate condition, scarcely retarded for Charles the awful reality of her bereavement.
The pale moon that has rolled over so many generations, and lent its dim, silvery light to so many thrilling vicissitudes, never looked down on a sadder scene. Death has no pang equal to the blow it give true affection. No language could describe what the heart feels on occasions like this. There sat the delicate French girl, alone in the dark night, on the side of Vesuvius, in the midst of the bleeding victims of the bloody fight, and clasping to her heart the cold, lifeless body of her ill-fated sister.
Her sudden and awful end, swept, perhaps, into eternity without a moment's notice, to be buried in the ashes of the volcano, amidst the dishonored remains of outlaws and murderers—does not the thought strike us that this sad fate was more the due of Alvira than the innocent and harmless Aloysia?
Alvira felt it, and her repentant heart was almost broke.
"O Aloysia!" hear her moan over the angelic form, "you innocent and I guilty; you slain, judged, and I free to heap greater ingratitude on the Being who has saved me. Aloysia, forgive! Thou wert dragged up unwillingly to these desperate scenes of bloodshed by my infatuation. O God! strike me. I am the wretch; let this angel live to honor thee in the angelic simplicity of innocence!"
Never was a fairer flower blasted by the lightning of Heaven. Neither Charles nor Henry knew what was before them in their march to Vesuvius. To surround and capture a few runaways was perhaps the most they expected; and Henry, in the confiding affection of her heart, clung to Charles, determined to bear fatigue and hardship rather than be separated from her.
It must be a painful picture that fancy will paint of the last hour of this lovely child. The anguish of her heart must have been keener than the deep wound that sent the life-streams to mingle with the lava of the mountain: no one to minister a drop of water to her parched lips; no friendly voice to console her; the moans and imprecations of the wounded brigands grating on her ears; the thought that her sister, too, was perhaps lying in pain, and sinking from her wounds; and, above all—that which, perhaps, sent the last blush to her cheek—the fear of the discovery of her sex, and the rough gaze of a brutal soldiery. But Heaven's sympathizing spirits were gathered around this child of misfortune, and doubtless with her last sigh he breathed her pure soul into their hands, and the last wish was answered—for she was good and innocent before God.
When the sun had fully risen, Charles was approached by a sergeant of the troops, who announced to her that the captain had died during the night from his wounds, and, as she was the senior officer, they waited her orders. Dissembling her grief, Charles rose to her feet and gave directions that the bodies of the captain and her brother should be buried in their clothes and wrapped in the flag of the country. The hardy veterans raised the delicate frame of Henry, and carried it on a rude bier to the hut where the remains of the captain were prepared for interment. Silent and solemn was the funeral cortege. No drum, not a funeral note, was heard. Every eye was wet, and the breast of Charles was not the only one that heaved the farewell sigh over the young and beautiful officer.
Charles stood by to see the last of her sister. The dark, black sand was poured down on her lovely face, and silently and quickly her mountain grave was filled by the blood-stained hands of her companions in arms.
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