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But, notwithstanding the favourable situation in which his affairs were placed, notwithstanding every fear from the Governor's party had been dissipated by his own and the Provincial army's valour, yet the mind of the Insurgent General was far from being at ease. He knew that Sir William Berkeley had transmitted accounts of the rebellion to his royal master, while it was yet in its infancy, with such exaggerations as must necessarily provoke the speediest vengeance of the Crown. A strong body of troops ere this was doubtless crossing the sea, and he determined to attack them as soon as they should land; the time also was drawing near when the Colonial Legislature was to hold its session, and he could not avoid feeling dread at the near approach of a crisis so full of importance and danger, the conclusion of which would involve a load of responsibility upon himself, and could be terminated favourably by his own courage and talents alone. He at length stated his situation to his wife, as he deemed it a piece of cruelty to conceal any thing from her which was so material to them both ; she had long noticed the deep concern which hung like a cloud over the bright pleasures which she had fondly hoped from his society, and she had endeavoured to rouse his spirits into gaiety by every winning art. It is chiefly in the hour of dark misfortune that the etherial soul of woman, disengaged from the grosser feelings of desire and passion, pours forth its most brilliant flood of light and splendour. Truly did the poet speak when he observed

-Oh! woman in our hours of ease
Uncertain, coy and hard to please;
And variable as the shade

By the light quivering aspen made,
When pain and anguish wring the brow,
A ministering angel, thou."

It was the peculiar spirit of proud acquiescence in the general feeling of hate to the existing form of government, and of devoted resignation to the stormy course which her husband pursued, that incited the wife of the Insurgent Chief to a state of determination little to be expected from the exquisite formation of her general character. She at once urged upon her husband the necessity of prompt and energetic resistance to the further oppression of the royal prerogative, the first encroachments of which he had so successfully combatted. With all the bold and independent feeling so completely in keeping with his own character, were these arguments enforced upon the attentive mind of the fond husband. It was only the fear of exciting further distress in the mind of his beloved spouse, that had checked the immediate impulse of action in the mind of Bacon; and now that this obstacle was removed by the firmness and resignation of her whom he most adored, the mind of the Insurgent was at once nerved for the most desperate extremities, and rebounded with the elasticity of a spring which had long remained in a state of contraction. He visited in person the whole of his partizans, and with them preserved a perfect understanding of the necessity of continued resistance to the royal government. By his powers of

eloquence, always directed to this one purpose, the Insurgent Chief was enabled to keep the fire of enthusiasm ever alive in the minds of his adherents. He enforced upon them the righteousness of their cause in the most glowing colours; he pictured it as a universal cause: that which belonged to man from his first great origin; and that it became every one as a soldier, to defend with his life, the rights which were involved with the interests of his brethren. These arguments produced the desired effect; the line of communication between the numerous members of his party was kept perfectly unbroken, and the spirit of persevering resistance continued completely undiminished.

But, the overpowering will of fate suddenly blasted all the fair prospects of the first grand colonial insurrection; the labors, trials and difficulties attendant upon the prosecution of his schemes, began to have an effect upon the General's health, and his disease quickly acquired a violence and malig nity which completely baffled the medical skill of the age. The news of their beloved leader's dangerous situation soon pervaded the Insurgent ranks, and the full danger of their own situation suddenly succeeded the boldness and enterprise which had attended their former acts, and one wild and desperate burst of sorrow was the universal sensation. Stretched upon his bed of death, surrounded by his most faithful and devoted officers, with his beloved Clara at his side, whose deep bursting sob alone denoted the possession of animated life, did the young Insurgent behold the last rising of that sun

which was to set after his frame had become a lifeHess corpse. Although wan and attenuated by disease, the spirits of the Chief had never sunk; he had fondly hoped for such a restoration of his health as would enable him to bear his cause triumphant through the approaching storm. He had gazed with renovated feelings upon the armour which was suspended in his view, and proudly anticipated the hour when its raven plume and glittering rapier would again mark him as the rallying point for the chivalry of his army. But upon the fatal morning of his decease the young Insurgent had become conscious of his approaching dissolution; he gathered his faithful band of officers around the couch where he lay; he recited in' a low faint voice, the services which he had rendered the Colony. As he proceeded to decribe the gallantry of his followers, his eye kindled with a fire which formed a strange contrast to the glassy film of death which was already obscuring the brightness of his vision, and his face kindled with the excitement of triumph into a bright, but an unearthly glow. He exhorted them to a continuance of the measures which he had followed, to an unyielding and uncompromising resistance of the regal authority; he warned them of too rash a belief in any promises of pardon and indemnity which might be extended, and urged them by all the arguments of renovated eloquence, to take refuge in the mountains and to trust to the good faith of the Savages, ere they should give way to any suggestions of peace and submission to the Governor. The voice of the General sunk into a whisper as he concluded his

sentence; his face again resumed its pallid, cadaverous hue, but it was for a moment; a faint flush once more overspread his features, and his last strong gaze was fixed upon the face of his wife with an expression of lingering regret and fondest undying devotion.

"Weep not, my dear Clara," he exclaimed in a faint tone, "for my death; so long as the remembrance of your husband shall exist, so long will you be cherished with kindness and affection by his devoted friends; hear me, Clara, it is my last request; let my dead body be committed to the earth in some far distant dell; let no sculptured tribute of respect mark the spot. I foresee the events which will succeed; the Governor will be reinstated, and the ashes of your husband, if discovered, will be cast abroad to the four winds." His voice suddenly failed; his features sunk into an immoveable serenity, his brow was overspread with the livid hue of death, and ere the surrounding officers could raise the lifeless form of Clara from the floor, the pulse was checked, the heart had ceased its throb, and vitality refused to exist in the frame of the first bold, chivalrous and noble Insurgent of the Old Dominion.

Hads't thou fall'n in fight, with thy warriors around thee,
With the shoutings of victory, mingled thy name;

In the moment of triumph tho' the death shot had found thee,
And caus'd thee to sink on the field of thy fame;

How proud then thy fall, on the gory turf lying,
A banner thy winding sheet, bloody and rent,
With thy comrades in battle to weep o'er thee dying,
And thy obsequies sung in the trumpet's lament.

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