The novels of Charles Brockden Brown, consisting of Wieland;or, The transformation. Arthur Mervyn; or, Memoirs of the year 1793. Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a sleep-walker. Jane Talbot. Ormond; or, The secret witness. Clara Howard; or, The enthusiasm of love. With a memoir of the author.

JANE TALBOT, 5
municated by the pen than by the lips. I admit your claim
to be acquainted with all the incidents of my life, be they
momentous or trivial. I have often told you that the retrospect is very mournful; but that ought not to prevent me
from making it, when so useful a purpose as that of thoroughly disclosing to you the character of one, on whom
your future happiness is to depend, will be affected by it.
I am not surprised that calumny has been busy.with my
life, aInd am very little anxious to clear myself from
unjust charges, except to such as you.
At this moment, I may add, my mood is not unfriendly
to the undertaking. I can do nothing in your absence
but write to you. To write what I have ten thousand
times spoken, and which can be perfectly understood
only when accompanied by looks and accents, seems
absurd. Especially while there is a subject on which
my tongue can never expatiate, but on which it is necessaWry that you should know all that I can tell you.
The prospect of filling up this interval with the relation
of the most affecting parts of my life somewhat reconciled
me to your necessary absence, yet I know my heart will
droop. Even this preparation to look back makes me
shudder already. Some reluctance to recall tragical or
humiliating scenes, and, by thus recalling to endure them,
in some sense, a second time, I must expect to feel.
But let me lay down the pen for the present. Let me
take my favourite and lonely path, and, by a deliberate
review of the past, refresh my memory and methodize
my recollections. Adieu till I return. J. T.
LETTER III.
To Henry Colden.
Tuesday Morning, 11 o'clock.
I AM glad I left not word how soon I meant to return,
for here has been, it seems, during my short absence, a
pair of gossips. They have just gone, lamenting the
disappointment, and leaving me a world of complimentary
condolences.
1.*