Asylum, The; Or, Alonzo and Melissa

Asylum, The; Or, Alonzo and Melissa, Gothic romance by Isaac Mitchell, published in 1811. An almost verbatim plagiarism appeared the same year under the title Alonzo and Melissa; or, The Unfeeling Father, credited to Daniel Jackson.

Melissa decides to marry Alonzo rather than Beauman, his rival, but her father, finding Alonzo to be penniless, parts the lovers and confines Melissa in a haunted ruined castle. She escapes to Charleston, whence comes the notice of her sudden death. In despair, Alonzo joins the navy, and is captured by the British during the Revolution, finally reaching home by way of France, where he is aided by Franklin. He goes to Charleston to weep at Melissa's grave, and in that city, keeping a tryst with a mysterious lady, discovers her to be Melissa. The mysterious actions in the castle are explained by the discovery that the ghosts are the device of a group of smugglers in the service of the British. Alonzo regains the family estate of which he had long been deprived, and the novel ends: “And now, reader of sensibility, indulge the pleasing sensations of thy bosom—for Alonzo and Melissa are MARRIED.”