From this unhappy period she remained at home a long time with her father. In kindred grief there was derived a congenial sympathy, and her society contributed in some degree to allay his sorrow, as the deep concern he felt in her welfare caused him sometimes to restrain the flow of it in her presence. Self-exertion roused him in a measure from his lethargy, and by thus assuming serenity, to become in reality something more composed. Nevertheless, he would often witness the excess of anguish which had taken place in the bosom of his child, and behold her interesting face bathed in tears, and her youthful brow clouded with a sadness that nothing seemingly could dissipate. [_NY Weekly_: Mrs. Mordaunt: to me they were inexpressibly soothing, from kindred grief there was derived a congenial sympathy. ... Their happiness, the education of my child, and self-exertion, roused me from the lethargy of grief, and diffused a calm over my mind I never hoped to have experienced.] His situation now became more sequestered than ever; he roamed in solitude, or pleased himself in ranging through silent glens in loneliness. His thoughts were absorbed in the gloomy experience of the misery of a painful separation from a dear and beloved object; he wept for her whose mild and winning graces had power to soften and illuminate the darkest shades of life, or alleviate the distressful scenes of adversity. [[This unidentified paragraph about Alida's widowed father reads like the description of a young romantic hero.]] His mind was wholly absorbed in those gloomy reflections that scarcely admitted a ray of consolation, when the weekly newspaper arrived from the neighbouring village; he took it up, hoping to find something to amuse his thoughts; he opened it to read the news of the day; he ran his eye hastily over it, and was about to lay it aside, "when the death list arrested his attention by a display of broad black lines," and he, who had not yet become reconciled to his present misfortune, was now about to experience another equally severe. [_A&M_ (Alonzo reads of Melissa's death): He returned, and as he was entering the door he saw the weekly newspaper of the town, which had been published that morning, and which the carrier had just flung into the hall. The family had not yet arisen. He took up the paper, carried it to his chamber, and opened it to read the news of the day. He ran his eye hastily over it, and was about to lay it aside, when the death list arrested his attention, by a display of broad black lines.] What could equal his bitterness, his surprise and grief, when he read the disastrous news that his youngest son (who had lately gone on a foreign expedition) had died of a fever in a distant land a few weeks previous!