Becoming America - An Exploration of American Literature from Precolonial to Post-Revolution, 2018a

BECOMING AMERICA
REVOLUTIONARY AND EARLY NATIONAL PERIOD LITERATURE
benevolence should render you anxious for my comfort in my present situation, I
take the liberty to assure you that I am amply provided for.
I have no claim even upon your pity; but from my long experience of your
tenderness. I presume to hope it will be extended to me. O my mother, if you knew
what the state of my mind is, and has been for months past, you would surely
compassionate my case. Could tears eace the stain which I have brought upon
my family, it would long since have been washed away; but, alas! tears are in vain;
and vain is my bitter repentance; it cannot obliterate my crime, nor restore me to
innocence and peace. In this life I have no ideas of happiness. These I have wholly
resigned. The only hope which aords me any solace is that of your forgiveness.
If the deepest contrition can make an atonement,—if the severest pains, both of
body and mind, can restore me to your charity,—you will not be inexorable. O, let
my suerings be deemed a sucient punishment, and add not the insupportable
weight of a parent’s wrath. At present I cannot see you. The eect of my crime is
too obvious to be longer concealed, to elude the invidious eye of curiosity. This
night, therefore, I leave your hospitable mansion. This night I become a wretched
wanderer from my paternal roof. O that the grave were this night to be my lodging!
Then should I lie down and be at rest. Trusting in the mercy of God, through the
mediation of his Son, I think I could meet my heavenly Father with more composure
and condence than my earthly parent.
Let not the faults and misfortunes of your daughter oppress your mind. Rather
let the conviction of having faithfully discharged your duty to your lost child
support and console you in this trying scene.
Since I wrote the above, you have kindly granted me your forgiveness, though
you knew not how great, how aggravated was my oence. You forgive me, you say.
O, the harmonious, the transporting sound! It has revived my drooping spirits, and
will enable me to encounter, with resolution, the trials before me.
Farewell, my dear mamma! Pity and pray for your ruined child; and be assured
that aection and gratitude will be the last sentiments which expire in the breast
of your repenting daughter,
ELIZA WHARTON.
Letter LXXI
TO MRS. LUCY SUMNER.
HARTFORD.
The drama is now closed! A tragical one it has proved!
How sincerely, my dear Mrs. Sumner, must the friends of our departed Eliza
sympathize with each other, and with her aicted, bereaved parent!
You have doubtless seen the account in the public papers which gave us the
melancholy intelligence. But I will give you a detail of circumstances.
A few days after my last was written, we heard that Major Sanford’s property
was attached, and he a prisoner in his own house. He was the last man to whom
we wished to apply for information respecting the forlorn wanderer; yet we had no
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