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152 misery? His silence she could have better borne, than those upbraidings for her too great poignancy of feeling: was it truly Philimore who had thus written,—he who had been wont to view her slightest qualities, words, and actions, through the magnifying medium and bright colouring of partiality? It was the hand-writing, the signature of Philimore,—but, alas! the altered sentiments his hand had traced too fatally prognosticated his heart was changed. "Why should he rebuke me," she inwardly exclaimed, "for a too great ardency of attachment?—has he not excited it?—is he not the object of it?"

But when, in proceeding to read, she came to the passage,—"that, for his part, present circumstances proving so adverse, and destiny having so long opposed their union, he began to relinquish the idea of its being ever effected;"—Oriana could no longer doubt; conviction struck upon her mind, and an icy chill pervaded her; she sat like one motionless, absorbed in all the lethargy of woe. The idea that the love of Philimore had abated, when hers for him seemed in its plenitude, was a most severe aggravation of her misfortune.

Those vows he had pledged of never-ceasing constancy, were they all forgotten?—vows breathed forth in moments when his whole being seemed dissolving into tenderness,—moments never to return,—was it to be so? A ray, such as appears in the dawn of hope, reflected for a moment upon her benighted soul. The congeniality of their minds, talents, and