Beulah - Page 134/348

The ensuing week was one of anxious apprehension to all within the

city. Harriet's words seemed prophetic; there was every intimation

of a sickly season. Yellow fever had made its appearance in several

sections of the town in its most malignant type. The board of health

devised various schemes for arresting the advancing evil. The

streets were powdered with lime and huge fires of tar kept

constantly burning, yet daily, hourly, the fatality increased; and,

as colossal ruin strode on, the terrified citizens fled in all

directions. In ten days the epidemic began to make fearful havoc;

all classes and ages were assailed indiscriminately. Whole families

were stricken down in a day, and not one member spared to aid the

others. The exodus was only limited by impossibility; all who could

abandoned their homes and sought safety in flight. These were the

fortunate minority; and, as if resolved to wreak its fury on the

remainder, the contagion spread into every quarter of the city. Not

even physicians were spared; and those who escaped trembled in

anticipation of the fell stroke. Many doubted that it was yellow

fever, and conjectured that the veritable plague had crossed the

ocean. Of all Mrs. Hoyt's boarders, but half a dozen determined to

hazard remaining in the infected region. These were Beulah, Clara,

and four gentlemen. Gladly would Clara have fled to a place of

safety, had it been in her power; but there was no one to accompany

or watch over her, and as she was forced to witness the horrors of

the season a sort of despair seemed to nerve her trembling frame.

Mrs. Watson had been among the first to leave the city. Madam St.

Cymon had disbanded her school; and, as only her three daughters

continued to take music lessons, Beulah had ample leisure to

contemplate the distressing scenes which surrounded her. At noon,

one September day, she stood at the open window of her room. The air

was intensely hot; the drooping leaves of the China trees were

motionless; there was not a breath of wind stirring; and the sable

plumes of the hearses were still as their burdens. The brazen,

glittering sky seemed a huge glowing furnace, breathing out only

scorching heat. Beulah leaned out of the window, and, wiping away

the heavy drops that stood on her brow, looked down the almost

deserted street. Many of the stores were closed; whilom busy haunts

were silent; and very few persons were visible, save the drivers of

two hearses and of a cart filled with coffins. The church bells

tolled unceasingly, and the desolation, the horror, were

indescribable, as the sable wings of the Destroyer hung over the

doomed city. Out of her ten fellow-graduates, four slept in the

cemetery. The night before she had watched beside another, and at

dawn saw the limbs stiffen and the eyes grow sightless. Among her

former schoolmates the contagion had been particularly fatal, and,

fearless of danger, she had nursed two of them. As she stood fanning

herself, Clara entered hurriedly, and, sinking into a chair,

exclaimed, in accents of terror: "It has come! as I knew it would! Two of Mrs. Hoyt's children have

been taken, and, I believe, one of the waiters also! Merciful God!

what will become of me?" Her teeth chattered, and she trembled from

head to foot.