ABSTRACT
‘My father, Sir Reginald Melbourne, had virtues; but they were of a cast so gloomy and severe, that even where his character raised esteem, it failed to excite love; and the first impression I recollect receiving from him, was that of fear. My mother, (Oh! how does fancy bleed upon recalling her sweet excellence,) joined to the most enchanting form, each nobler quality of heart and mind. We were one – I loved her with a tenderness, a companionship of affection, far beyond what is usually felt, in a relation such as ours. I seemed to her, born to enable her to bear the load of domestic tyranny; a tyranny which, while it rendered her home insupportable, made her appear to an ill-judging world, given up to its pleasures – they called her gay, unthinking – I knew her heart; ’twas all softness; ’twas what I fear Julia’s will be; and while I witnessed the tears she often shed in private, could feel how much she was formed for a different scene. To me was unveiled the elegance of her mind, the sensibility of her heart. She delighted to form my youth to something beyond the general routine of public studies; and the similarity of our tastes, a resemblance to her, that was said to exist in the manners and way of thinking of her dearest blessing, as she often fondly called me, served more strongly to cement our union. The first long separation I endured from her, was when I left my paternal mansion for the University. The tears she shed at parting were prophetic; my grief I carefully concealed, that her’s / might not be increased by beholding it. –
