“So God help me and mine as I promise,” I replied, “on one condition:  return with me to Windsor.”

“To Windsor!” he cried with a shriek, “Never!—­from this place I never go —­my bones, my flesh, I myself, are already buried here, and what you see of me is corrupted clay like them.  I will lie here, and cling here, till rain, and hail, and lightning and storm, ruining on me, make me one in substance with them below.”

In a few words I must conclude this tragedy.  I was obliged to leave London, and Adrian undertook to watch over him; the task was soon fulfilled; age, grief, and inclement weather, all united to hush his sorrows, and bring repose to his heart, whose beats were agony.  He died embracing the sod, which was piled above his breast, when he was placed beside the beings whom he regretted with such wild despair.

I returned to Windsor at the wish of Idris, who seemed to think that there was greater safety for her children at that spot; and because, once having taken on me the guardianship of the district, I would not desert it while an inhabitant survived.  I went also to act in conformity with Adrian’s plans, which was to congregate in masses what remained of the population; for he possessed the conviction that it was only through the benevolent and social virtues that any safety was to be hoped for the remnant of mankind.

It was a melancholy thing to return to this spot so dear to us, as the scene of a happiness rarely before enjoyed, here to mark the extinction of our species, and trace the deep uneraseable footsteps of disease over the fertile and cherished soil.  The aspect of the country had so far changed, that it had been impossible to enter on the task of sowing seed, and other autumnal labours.  That season was now gone; and winter had set in with sudden and unusual severity.  Alternate frosts and thaws succeeding to floods, rendered the country impassable.  Heavy falls of snow gave an arctic appearance to the scenery; the roofs of the houses peeped from the white mass; the lowly cot and stately mansion, alike deserted, were blocked up, their thresholds uncleared; the windows were broken by the hail, while the prevalence of a north-east wind rendered out-door exertions extremely painful.  The altered state of society made these accidents of nature, sources of real misery.  The luxury of command and the attentions of servitude were lost.  It is true that the necessaries of life were assembled in such quantities, as to supply to superfluity the wants of the diminished population; but still much labour was required to arrange these, as it were, raw materials; and depressed by sickness, and fearful of the future, we had not energy to enter boldly and decidedly on any system.

I can speak for myself—­want of energy was not my failing.  The intense life that quickened my pulses, and animated my frame, had the effect, not of drawing me into the mazes of active life, but of exalting my lowliness, and of bestowing majestic proportions on insignificant objects—­I could have lived the life of a peasant in the same way—­my trifling occupations were swelled into important pursuits; my affections were impetuous and engrossing passions, and nature with all her changes was invested in divine attributes.  The very spirit of the Greek mythology inhabited my heart; I deified the uplands, glades, and streams, I