Page:Duty and Inclination. Volume 3.pdf/142

140 efforts to appear what he really was not, had he relinquished all subterfuge and stratagem, had he acted with a perfect sincerity and uprightness, he might, with so much influence as he possessed in other respects, have succeeded better. Happily for Rosilia, that from the depraved ideas of his mind he was unfitted to form a conception of the pure and holy delights of wedded love, it terminated otherwise, and that his hypocrisy, since she could not fathom it, proved eventually the cause of his defeat.

At eight in the morning, the old travelling carriage, which, about sixteen months before had transported the De Brooke family to London, drew up at the door to convey them back to Glamorganshire. Oriana was to remain with her aunt, and Rosilia's eyes moistened at the recollection of their parting interview.

A few miles' travelling composed her, and she felt herself at length equal to relate to her parents the whole of Melhphant's proceedings, as far as they were known to or suspected by her, stating the reasons which had prevented her doing so sooner.

Mrs. De Brooke, in following her daughter's narration, trembled at the situation in which she had been placed: she could only exclaim at its conclusion. "What consummate audacity!"

"Who could have thought," added the General, that the villain should yet have gone so far as to elude our vigilance. The last day of our stay, I had not the least supposition," added he, addressing