1830.] The Warning Voice. 403 



Vernon seemed bursting in his bosom, when he saw Isabel, once so gay, 

 so lovely and so bright, reduced to a pallid and emaciated spectre. 

 Long silent, her eyes alone seemed to reproach his stern decision, but 

 eventually duty as a mother, made her plead with nature's eloquence, 

 not for herself, but for her child. She pointed to the famished soldiers, 

 and called on her husband not vainly to sacrifice them. Thus to act, she 

 argued, was not loyalty but fatuity, as it destroyed those who might 

 otherwise become at a future day the defenders of their king. He lent 

 a deaf ear to her touching representations ; but at last her imploring 

 voice, the clamours of his starving men, and perhaps the feelings of a 

 parent, unconsciously moving him to save his offspring, vanquished reso- 

 lution. He consented to capitulate, and obtained what, under the cir- 

 cumstances, seemed very favourable terms. On giving up the place, his 

 soldiers were allowed to march out with the honours of war, and having 

 grounded their arms, to go where they pleased. Bitter was the anguish 

 and regret of Vernon, when the true cause of this moderation became 

 apparent, and when it was made known to him that a strong body of 

 royalists, were on their way to relieve Bletchington House, who within 

 the next four and twenty hours, would have compelled the Parliamen- 

 tary force to retire. 



Though Isabel shared the sorrow of her husband, at learning that the 

 king's forces were so near, she still exulted in having saved his life. 

 From the extremity of suffering, previously endured, she doubted if he 

 could have survived another day. The expediency of surrendering the 

 place under such circumstances, was, to her mind, so indisputably 

 established, that, even when a court martial had been called at Oxford, 

 she looked forward to the result without dismay, and confidently antici- 

 pated an honourable acquittal for Vernon. 



The court did not close its proceedings till midnight. No messenger 

 announced the result to Isabel. The absence of special intelligence was 

 satisfactory. That Vernon should be exonerated, was a matter of 

 course. 



And when it was signified to her on the following morning, that the 

 prisoner desired to see her, she still felt assured his detention was but a 

 matter of form, and approached him with a smile. 



" It is past," he sadly remarked ; " your fond anxiety to save my life, 

 has destroyed me." 



" Destroyed you, Vernon ! Can the court doubt ?" 



" No, Isabel ; they do not doubt. Their decision has been pro- 

 nounced : it is recorded, and I am lost." 



" How ! Are you not restored ? Is it possible that their decision 

 can be unfavourable ?" 



" It is even so ; and I am proclaimed a coward to the world !" 



" And if the world be mean and miserable enough to credit the 

 calumny, then, my Vernon, leave such a world." 



" I must leave it." 



" And do so without regret ; for it merits not your care. Renounce it 

 for ever despise the phantom fame, and live but to love and Isabel." 



" He who is bereft of fame and honour, can have no occasion for life. 

 You, Isabel, must feel this. Start not, then, while I announce what I 

 judged you must have previously learned : I am sentenced to die !" 



Isabel was little prepared for the awful intelligence, that the court had 

 condemned Vernon to death. 



3 F 2 



