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178 renewing her visit the next morning; at the same time entreating her not to relapse into dejection, but to consider the present crisis of her husband's affairs, as the necessary means by which he would be restored to happiness and tranquillity.

Notwithstanding, however, this consolatory exhortation of her friend, short and painful was the repose of Mrs. De Brooke. She rose at an early hour, having determined after a hasty breakfast to set off to see her husband. A witness of the sorrowful scene which had taken place the preceding evening, but not a passive one, it was to the vigilance of his ever faithful servant Robert, who had anxiously followed through various turnings and windings the coach conveying his master to prison, that Mrs. De Brooke was indebted for a knowledge of the direction she was to pursue. At the first dawn he had been up, and had stolen slowly out of the house to retrace the path he had trodden the night before. Hovering about those impenetrable walls, within whose gloomy precincts was confined his beloved master, he awaited in sad expectation the first opening of the gates, in order to gain the earliest admittance. Having fulfilled his object, he returned, with moistened brow and breathless haste, in time to deliver a letter with