The Coquette | Page 3

born in 1752. She was a child
of early promise, and remarkable in maturer years for her genius (I use
the term in no merely conventional sense, as will hereafter appear) and
accomplishments, as well as for her genial spirit and tender and
endearing qualities. Her maternal ancestor, Thomas Stanley, was an
original owner and settler in Hartford, Connecticut, and removed to,
and died in, Hadley, Massachusetts, January 30, 1662-3.
Thus nobly descended and connected, so singularly unfortunate, and
her fate so afflicting and disastrous, it is no wonder that the novelist
pointed her pen to record, with historical accuracy, a destiny so fearful,
a career so terrible. By her exceeding personal beauty and
accomplishments, added to the wealth of her mind, she attracted to her
sphere the grave and the gay, the learned and the witty, the worshippers
of the beautiful, with those who reverently bend before all inner graces.
Prominent among these was the Rev. Joseph Howe, then pastor at the
New South Church, on Church Green, in this city, a young man of rare
talents and eminent piety. Unfortunately, the fear and excitement

consequent on the hostile relation of the colonies at that time towards
the mother country forced him from his position here; and he left, with
the family whose house had been his home, for a more quiet, temporary
retreat in Norwich, Connecticut. Soon after this he repaired to the
residence of Rev. Mr. Whitman, in Hartford, for a short visit, high in
the anticipation of soon becoming the happy husband of the gifted
daughter Elizabeth. But Providence, in wisdom, had ordered it
otherwise; and, while on this visit, he suddenly sickened and died.
However much or little of soul or of sorrow she had in this event we are
not to know; but another stood ready to-worship in his place, what we
will endeavor to believe was in some degree worthy of homage. This
was "J. Boyer," known as the Rev. Joseph Buckminster, a graduate of
Yale College, and at that time tutor in the same institution, who
afterwards settled as minister over the religions society in Portsmouth,
New Hampshire, and whose Biography was but a few years ago
published.
We have no reason to believe, however, that either of these persons was
her earliest choice, especially the latter, or that, in this case most
certainly, there could have been at all that sacred congeniality of spirit
so deeply necessary to woman's nature, bearing out from her bosom
that deathless affection which nor pride, nor affluence, nor folly, nor
love of conquest, with the victory every where certain, could in any
wise overcome.
The feeling that existed on her part was of circumstances only,
influenced by strong parental predilection, and the desire which so
often obtains in the heart of a true woman--that of soothing the love she
cannot return, resolving itself at length into pity.
We might here also dwell upon the idiosyncrasies of genius as
applicable to her case, which are generally banned, of whatever
character they may be, and evermore shut out all sympathy, till, in
despair or despite, folly is made crime. But since sin must ever be
arraigned for itself, and error is prone to plead for mercy, I leave no
word here that can be misconstrued or misapplied. Certain it is that
Elizabeth Whitman was marked as one of strangely fluctuating moods,
as the truly gifted ever are, and of a wild, incomprehensible nature,
little understood by those who should have known her best, and with
whom she was most intimate. Over this, in tracing her history, it were

well to pause, were it not that thus we might give countenance to this
prominent fact of modern days, that the eccentricities of genius are
often substituted for genius itself, or are made its prime characteristics,
as the gold of the jeweller is recommended for its beauty and strength
in proportion to its alloy.
However much we may regret the waywardness of such a heart in the
present instance, in that it rejected one so nobly qualified as was Mr.
Buckminster to appreciate its genius and its love, while sympathizing
with his own mortifying disappointment, (for this we must admit,) that
she had in the secrets of her nature a preference for another, we cannot
altogether know its results. So cautiously and discreetly did he, through
a long and beautiful life, qualify both his lips and his pen, that little or
nothing remains beyond these letters of the novelist--which we may not
doubt are authentic, as they were long in the possession of Mrs. Henry
Hill, of Boston, the "Mrs. Sumner" of the novel--to tell how the heart
was instructed, and how blighted hope and blasted affection were made
the lobes through which the spirit caught its sublimest and holiest
respiration.