" "Father," I rejoined, "from your manners and your
observations, I perceive that you have acquired much experience of human
life. If you have leisure, relate to me, I beseech you, the history of the
ancient inhabitants of this desert; and be assured, that even the men who
are most perverted by the prejudices of the world, find a soothing pleasure
in contemplating that happiness which belongs to simplicity and virtue."
The old man, after a short silence, during which he leaned his face upon
his hands, as if he were trying to recall the images of the past, thus began
his narration:--
"Monsieur de la Tour, a young man who was a native of Normandy, after
having in vain solicited a commission in the French Army, or some support
from his own family, at length determined to seek his fortune in this
island, where he arrived in 1726. He brought hither a young woman whom he
loved tenderly, and by whom he was no less tenderly beloved. She belonged
to a rich and ancient family of the same province; but he had married her
without fortune, and in opposition to the will of her relations, who
refused their consent, because he was found guilty of being descended from
parents who had no claims to nobility. Monsieur de la Tour, leaving his
wife at Port Louis, embarked for Madagascar, in order to purchase a few
slaves to assist him in forming a plantation in this island. He landed at
that unhealthy season which commences about the middle of October: and soon
after his arrival died of the pestilential fever, which prevails in that
country six months of the year, and which will forever baffle the attempts
of the European nations to form establishments on that fatal soil.
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