passed before the eye of the mind too quickly to be grasped? Is this crimethis natural yearning after perfection even in the material world? No-my heart loved and cherished its own wild imaginings, and revolted from an union with the plain bride, that could touch none of its tenderest tones, and awaken none of its most impassioned sympathies.

66

My engagement to Camilla assumed

-he pro

now an aspect the most revolting. To be compelled to accept a wife I had not chosen, was depriving me of that right to freedom of action of which man is justly the most tenacious. I do not impute blame to my father; mised to his dying friend, that the union of their children should give him a daughter. He strove strenuously and honourably to place us in such a position as to render the redeeming of his pledge a matter of inclination to us, as well as a point of honour to himself. If I had never quitted my native hills, perhaps —

but, no!-the sympathy with beauty already lived in my breast, although I deemed not of the secret inhabitant; the time of awakening must have arrived; it might have come too late.

"Sir William, you already anticipate that these feelings did not long retain their general character; they were

soon individualized.

"If the perfection of beauty ever shone on this earth, enthralling the senses of man, touching his heart, bewildering his understanding-it is possessed by Matilda- my future wife. See her, see her only, Sir William, and tell me, could the imagination of man, already kindled by dreams of divine charms, resist so dazzling a combination of them ?"

Aubertin paused. He had hitherto spoken, as I have already remarked, with great rapidity. But now his eloquence failed him entirely. The gloom on his countenance deepened, and his paces were most unmathematically irregular.

He resumed with an unequal and subdued tone, interrupting himself fre quently by pauses evidently resulting from feelings that came upon him unawares, and obtained no better welcome than other unbidden guests.

"My father's refusal was most decisive he would not suffer me to wreck the peace of Camilla, he said. I had played the lover to her too long to think of retracting. She loved me-tenderly, devotedly, with all of woman's faith and patience and endurance. True, truemost true! I felt it all, Sir William; and, in my present circumstances, to feel it without pain would betray an unmanly callosity of which I am not ambitious. Candid by principle, by inclination, by habit, Camilla's mind is always submitted to the inspection of those whose interests are in the least degree associated with her own; I knew that-in short, if I had adored Matilda less- if she had had one atom less of beauty-if Camilla had

had one, one brighter tint - but these things were not so and besides, other reflections determined me.

"The grand, the leading principle of Camilla's life, to which all her actions are made to refer the test by which all are judged is not the moral sublimity with which philosophy regulates her lofty standard of human excellence → for she contemplates man in a degraded and abject state from which there is no possibility of his rising, except by the light of the Spirit of God;-it is, by continually asking herself the fanatical question, Would CHRIST approve this? Did HE act thus ?'-Now, Sir William, I, who pretend to be no better than my neighbours, and who dislike any thing that savours of saintship, its root and branches, would not choose to be the husband of a woman who, by thus severely scrutinizing her own actions, would be little likely to examine those of her husband with greater lenity."

"Pardon me, that is an error of judgment," said I. "A person forming her conduct on the model you describe, would be the last in the world to deem harshly of others."

"With such principles," he proceeded, his colour a little heightened, "there must evidently be so total a discrepancy between Camilla and myself, as, if all other circumstances were favourable, would be sufficient to render our union unwise.-My father thought otherwise; he believed that I should become the neophyte of my wife wife-he interdicted all thought of my marriage with Matilda. Nothingno prayers- no reasoning of minewere sufficient to shake his resolution. I was very wretched. As my forlorn hope, I flew to Camilla herself-confessed my situation-and-and-besought her to plead for me."

"And how did she act?" demanded I, with all the interest a circumstance so extraordinary inspired.

"She said little; she asked for a few