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Rh her parents taking their leave of the Doctor, Philimore, hastily striding across the apartment, fled from the possibility of observation or intrusion. Leaving him in quiet possession of the Hermitage, Dr. Lovesworth proposed walking back with his friends to the Bower.

Suffering under the most painful solicitude, no sooner had Oriana arrived at home, than she intimated a wish to prolong with Rosilia her walk, to which her mother readily acquiescing, freed from further restraint or opposition, she yielded herself to those overpowering feelings which with such afflictive efforts she had controlled.

"Let us hasten back, Rosilia," she exclaimed; "let us delay not a moment; did you not observe the state of Philimore? 'twas dreadful, 'twas horrid to behold! I must see him! it is agony—insupportable agony! to know, that he is even now suffering under the stings of that barbarous letter which, by your advice alone, I was prevailed upon to write; indignant at which he has already, perhaps, taken his resolution, and will leave us."

Breathless with the celerity of her pace, unmindful of what her sister uttered, whether meant in soothing, or entreaty to check her precipitancy, she stopped not but to sound the bell which was