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.

THE SECRET WITNESS.

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view, cultivation was subservient to the picturesque, and
a mansion was erected, eminent for nothing but chastity
of ornaments and simplicity of structure. The massive
parts were of stone; the outer surfaces were smooth,
snow-white, and diversified by apertures and cornices,
in which a cement uncommonly tenacious was wrought
into proportions the most correct and forms the most
graceful. The floors, walls, and ceilings, consisted of
a still more exquisitely-tempered substance, and were
painted by Mr. Dudley's own hand. All appendages
of this building, as seats, tables, and cabinets, were
modelled by the owner's particular direction, and in a
manner scrupulously classical.
He had scarcely entered on the enjoyment of this
splendid possession, when it was ravished away. No
privation was endured with more impatience than this;
but, happily, it was purchased by one who left Mr. Dudley's arrangements unmolested, and who shortly after
conveyed it entire to Ormond. By him it was finally
appropriated to the use of Helena Cleves, and now, by
a singular contexture of events, it had reverted to those
hands in which the death of the original proprietor, if
no other change had been made in his condition, would
have left it. The farm still remained in the tenure of a
German emigrant, who held it partly on condition of
preserving the garden and mansion in safety and in perfect order.
This retreat was now revisited by Constantia, after an
interval of four years. Autumn had made some progress, but the aspect of nature was, so to speak, more
significant than at any other season. She was agreeably
accommodated under the tenant's roof, and found a nameless pleasure in traversing spaces in which every object
prompted an endless train of recollections.
Her sensations were not foreseen. They led to a state
of mind inconsistent, in some degree, with the projects
adopted in obedience to the suggestions of a friend.
Every thing in this scene had been created and modelled
by the genius of her father. It was a kind of fane,
sanctified by his imaginary presence.
To consign the fruits of his industry and invention to
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