It bore no dates, but was evidently recently erected. The name I did not recognize, but the tender, unpretending inscription, sensibly touched my heart, and I felt a strong desire to know the history of her whose virtues needed no external record. My friend read my feelings, and immediately drew my attention to the next tomb-stone. It bore a long list of lineage, beauty, amiability, &c. &c. and as I read the long and beautiful detail, I almost questioned the justice of Omnipotence in thus snatching, in early life, from mortal gaze, so pure, so beautiful a pattern of every female grace and excellence. “Only twenty-four,” I exclaimed, “and yet so highly exalted, so much beloved.” My friend smiled archly and remarked, “Have you seen so much of the world and not yet learned that real merit rarely has loud trumpeters?” Her manner surprised me, and I inquired the meaning. It is too late now, said she, to enter into the narrative about which you feel so much interested; to-morrow I will relate the history of both these women, whose tombs are not more strikingly different than were their lives and characters. United in life by a strange destiny, or rather by strange circumstances, it is fit that their last dwellings should be near each other, and that their monuments, like their characters, should stand forth in striking contrast. * * * * * Matilda Clayton was the only daughter of the poor widow who removed to this village a short time before you left here, and who for years has taught the village school. Perhaps you remember the interest her coming gave to all the lovers of mystery in our circle. She was dressed in black. Her child was about twelve or fourteen; beautiful as a fairy, and seemingly a visitor from some etherial sphere—so delicate, so gentle was her every glance and movement. They brought with them an elegant harp and guitar, and two richly painted portraits. Of their characters or former home, nothing could be gathered. She rented that house which you see among those lofty oaks, and furnished it in a style of neat simplicity and taste. Soon after she came, she issued proposals for a school, but few at first seemed disposed to patronize her; and though curiosity was strongly manifested to know who and what she was, all that could be gathered was the assertion that she was the widow of an officer, whose untimely death had left her friendless, and induced her, to seek among strangers, a home and support. Months passed by, and her correct deportment—the pure elegance of her manners, and her various accomplishments, gained her the good-will and confidence of some of the leading characters in the village, by whose influence a considerable number of scholars was soon procured. Among her friends and patrons was Mr. Wilton; and his daughter Clara, then {781} about the age of Matilda, was the first committed to her care.