Page:Duty and Inclination. Volume 3.pdf/68

66 We have said that Rosilia was in the habit of frequenting some pleasant gardens, at no great distance from her home. There she could range the winding walks, unseen of any; it was there she had always felt herself at liberty, free from intrusion. But even there that demon, seeking her destruction, found her! As an arch-fiend, full of guileful intent, unperceived he had traced her footsteps, and followed as she entered.

Why was it that in so large a city, abounding with innumerable delights of every kind, everything cloyed, all was insipid, and nothing pleased? How came it to pass that nothing possessed a charm that could, for one moment, abstract his attention from Rosilia; divert him from those cruel, persevering endeavours to tear from its parent stem that flower, at once displaying to the view, truth, innocence, and beauty? Animated alone by the perfidious love that led him to destroy the sole motive of his pursuit. And when gathered, what might its fragrance avail him? Alas! nought; robbed of its lustre, with inhuman barbarity to be cast adrift! For desolate and forsaken on the wide face of the earth is she whose mind has yielded to the attacks of sophistry in its systematic seduction. It is not the marriage tie, neither is it rank nor affluence that can wash away the stain, and restore lost virtue and innocence!

Could nothing induce Melliphant to desist from his infernal purpose? No! there is that in the human