was done, have entirely secured him from any danger of that dreadful kind; but the exertion, the agitation, and the operation itself, which was very painful, have brought on some fever, which it will require care and prudence to subdue.'

This new anxiety diverted my thoughts for the time from the difficulties of my own position, and I roused and exerted myself in order to be allowed to leave my room, the solitude of which I dreaded in my present state of restless excitement; but society seemed to me still more trying when I had to encounter it. I could hardly bear to hear the occurrences of the day discussed. Everybody was informed of what I had done; and the praises which were bestowed on my courage and presence of mind were uttered with smiles and tones which proved to me that, if they were not aware of all the circumstances of the case, it was at least sufficiently evident that the feelings which had prompted me at the moment had been attributed to their true cause. Rosa, especially, tormented me by allusions and playful attacks, which I could hardly bear with patience; and at last I showed my annoyance in so marked a manner that she abstained from any further reference to the subject.

Later in the evening, when the doctor came again, he found Edward's fever much increased; and when this intelligence was brought to the drawing-room, Rosa showed true and warm sympathy in the anxiety which I could no longer conceal.

A few minutes afterwards Mrs. Middleton beckoned me out of the room, and told me that Edward was in a state of intense nervous agitation, which was the more extraordinary from its contrast with his usual calm and quiet disposition. 'He is quite unlike himself,' she continued, 'and can hardly be persuaded to submit to the necessary restraint which the doctor prescribes. He says he must see you and speak to

you this evening; and insisted on getting up and coming to the drawing-room. At last I persuaded him to lie down again on his couch, by promising that you should come to him. After what passed between you this morning there can be no objection to it. Only remember, dear child, that everything you say to him must be calculated to soothe and calm him, for Dr. Nevis says that he could not answer for the consequences of any agitation or sudden emotion at this moment. This it was that determined me to come and fetch you, when I saw him so feverishly anxious to see you —especially as now, I am sure, that you can have nothing to say to him that will not have a tranquillising effect on his nerves, and help to give him a good night's rest, which is the greatest possible object in his present state.'

As my aunt talked on in this manner, while she led the way to Edward's room, I could not summon courage to object to this visit till, when we got near to the door, I drew back and whispered to her: 'Indeed I had better not go in; after what occurred this morning, considering all things, it may agitate him to see me. Indeed, indeed, it will be better not. Mrs. Middleton looked at me with surprise: 'Have I not told you, Ellen, that he has been working himself into a fever from his anxiety to speak to you? The only chance of calming him is by yielding to this wish, and I assure you,' she continued in an earnest manner, ‘it may be more important than you seem to think to accomplish this. The consequences may be very serious if this fever and nervous agitation should increase.'

As she said these words, without any further discussion, she opened the door, and I found myself in another moment seated by Edward's side, his burning hand in mine, and his eyes fixed upon me with that intense and overstrained expression which fever gives.

'Dearest Ellen,' he exclaimed, as Mrs. Middleton left

the room, 'I am unreasonable and ashamed of myself, but I could not rest or have a moment's peace before I had again heard from your lips the blessed assurance that all that made me so happy this morning, in spite of our fears and anxieties, was not a dream. Say it was not, dearest.'

'It was no dream,' I answered in a low voice, 'but we must not speak of such dreamlike things to-night. When you are well

'I am well now,' he interrupted, 'if you relieve my mind from a vague fear that has haunted me ever since. Ellen, there is no obstacle to our marriage, is there? You will be my wife? You do not answer-you do not speak?'

His hand, which held mine, trembled, and he grew paler still than when I had entered the room. Terrified at his agitation, I lost the last opportunity of retracting, and murmured: 'Yes, yes, dearest Edward, I will be your wife. May God in heaven bless you and forgive me,' I internally added. 'And now that I have set your mind at rest,' I said, with a forced smile, 'I will leave you.'

'Leave me!' he rejoined, 'now that you have made me happier than words can express! No, don't leave me now, my Ellen, my darling Ellen, whom I have loved since the days of childhood, whom I have watched with an earnest anxiety that has made me, I will own it now' (he kissed my hand tenderly as he said this), 'often unreasonable, often unjust.'

'No, no!' I exclaimed, 'that you have never been.'

'Yes, I have, Ellen,' he continued, with earnestness; 'though I saw much in your voice, in your countenance, and in your manner, that made me feel I was not indifferent to you, still I was tormented with doubts and with jealousies which were unworthy of you and of myself. What I now see was only pity and kindness for others, I construed into causes for suspicion; what I now feel was forbearance and

I thought

delicacy of feeling on your part, I called deceit. you deceitful—I called you deceitful, yet my own heart contradicted me, Ellen, for it would never have loved you, clung to you, as it has done had you not been true-truer in your changeable moods and unguarded impulses "than those that have more cunning to be strange." No, my dearest, my precious love! if falsehood or deceit had ever stained those dear lips of yours—if they had ever sullied the purity of your spotless nature-my love would have vanished, and my heart hardened against you. The very strength of my own affection pleaded for you when appearances, or my own jealous feelings, accused you. Will you forgive me,

dearest ?'

'Forgive you!' I exclaimed, while a choking sob rose in my throat, ‘God knows————___

'I do not doubt you,' he eagerly cried; 'I do not ask you to explain or to reassure me. Have I not already acquitted you and accused myself? I should be a wretch, my Ellen, if, after having received from you the greatest proof of love which a woman could give, the shadow of a doubt could remain on my mind of the purity and of the strength of your affection. Do you think, my own love, that I should have suffered you to give me that proof of unexampled devotion had I not believed and felt that you were then suffering the agony of apprehension which I had suffered a moment before?—that your love was great as mine; and that is saying everything, for I feel, now, Ellen, that to lose you would kill me.'

I laid my head on his shoulder, and murmured a few words of tenderness in his ear. My heart was swelling, and my head was dizzy. Three times while he had spoken I had been on the point of breaking out into vehement denials and passionate self-accusations, and each time the doctor's warning, confirmed by Edward's tremulous voice

and eager hurried manner, so different from his usual composure, checked the words on my lips, and thrust back into my bosom the remorse and shame which overwhelmed me. Yet, in the midst of all this suffering and this shame, there was a joy which, like a meteor in a stormy sky, illuminated at moments the darkness with which it struggled; and to drown the voice of conscience I repeated to myself that, in spite of the deceit I had practised under the influence of what I deemed an irresistible fatality, there was truth, there was reality, in the ardent affection which I bore to him whose hand I held, and against whose breast my burning forehead was laid, as if I sought there a refuge from the world, from myself, and from my own upbraiding memory.

After a pause, but in a voice of perfect confidence and tenderness, Edward said to me: 'Why would you not marry me three months ago, dearest? Did you think that my love was not great enough, or was yours not yet—————’

'Oh, no,' I interrupted, 'such love as mine is not the growth of a few days; but ask me not to explain the waywardness, the strange inconsistency of a character which you, wise and good as you are, can never perfectly understand.'

There passed a slight cloud over Edward's countenance at that moment, but it was only for an instant, and in the gentlest manner he said, 'Perhaps I may never quite understand you, Ellen, but I can always trust you. You have always been unlike everybody else, particularly unlike me, with my matter-of-fact stubbornness, and that is probably why you bewitched me against my will, and in spite of all my resolutions,' he added, with a smile; 'I suppose I never have quite understood you, but to admire blindly and ardently what we feast understand is one of the peculiarities of human nature, so you must e'en admit this excuse.'

Again he kissed my hand with the fondest affection, and then at my earnest request he suffered me to leave him.