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246 was jealous of her god-daughter's fondness for Rosilia;" adding, "she truly believed the child felt for her a greater preference than for herself;" upon which Rosilia, raising the little cherub upon her lap, again clasped her to her bosom, and whilst still bending over that pledge of past affection, lent an attentive ear to the pride and pleasure with which Mrs. Melbourne expatiated upon the virtues of the father.

A pause ensuing, Mrs. De Brooke inquired the cause of his so suddenly leaving India, at a moment when, being appointed to the staff, his situation was so honourable and lucrative; and whether it had sprung from the pernicious effects of the climate upon his constitution, which appeared to have so much suffered.

Rosilia recollected to have put the same question upon her first meeting with Douglas at the cottage, and remembered the emotion he had then betrayed; for which reason she listened with greater curiosity to the account given by Mrs. Melbourne, who, however, being in total ignorance of the associations of ideas connected with the wound he had received in defence of Harcourt, and his repairing to England in consequence, had not the power to convey to Rosilia any conception of the nature of those deep conflicts he was necessitated, upon Harcourt's account, to endure for her sake. The friendship and the rivalship existing between Harcourt and himself, the painful and delicate situation in which he found himself placed, called for the