nnish all comforte. And now I knowe that
our lives wear vainity. I ashure you, dear sister, I am prodidjusly
sadd when I reffleckt upon this truth--ashuredly it is a harde saying."

Anon comes that strange foreknowledge of death--that instinctive sense
of the shadowy hand so soon to lay him at rest; and with that mystic
prescience comes a yearning for the little child M. to be laid where
his father may lay down beside him. There are many passages in the
latter letters which afford a clue to that mysterious midnight burial
at Dewsdale.

"Last nite I drem't of the cherchyarde at S. I satte under the olde
yewe tree, as it semed in my dreme, and hurd a childes voice crying in
a very piteous mannerr. The thort of this dreme has oppress'd my
speritts all day, and Rebecka has enquier'd more than wunce wot ales
me. If little M. but lay nere at hande, in ye graive to wich I fele I
must soone be carrid, I beleive I shou'd be happyer. Reproove me for
this folley if you plese. I am getting olde, and Sattan temts me with
seche fooleish thorts. Wot dose it matter to my sole wear my vile bodie
is laid? and yet I have a fonde fooleish desier to be berrid with
littel M."

And in these latest letters there is ample evidence of that yearning on
Matthew's part to reveal a secret which Rebecca's own correspondence
betrays.

"We tawked of manny things, and she was more than ordinnary kind and
gentel. I had a mind to tell her about M, and aske her frendship for C;
but she seemed not to cair to here my sekrets, and I think wou'd be
offended if she new the trooth. So I cou'd not finde courrage to tell
her. Before I die I shal speek planely for the saik of C. and M. and ye
little one. I shal cum to U. erly nex weak to make my Wille, and this
time shal chainge my umour no more. I have burnt ye laste, not likeing
it."

This passage occurs in the last letter, amongst the packet confided to
me. The letter is dated September 5, 1774. On the fourteenth of the
following month Matthew died, and in all probability the will here
alluded to was never executed. Certain it is that Matthew, whose end
was awfully sudden at the last, died intestate, whereby his son John
inherited the bulk, and ultimately the whole, of his fortune. There are
many allusions to this infant son in the last few letters; but I do not
think the little creature obtained any great hold on the father's
heart. No doubt he was bound and swaddled out of even such small
semblance to h