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228, in her opinion respecting herself, he had been ever far from being so: and it was on one of those gala nights given by Mrs. Melbourne, that Douglas had formed the decided resolution of saving her from the perilous situation in which he imagined he beheld her, arising from the danger of her so openly giving countenance to him whose vanity was already but too much excited—leading him, in consequence, so perseveringly to engross her.

Turning her looks unconsciously to that part of the assembly where Douglas leaned, engaged in serious contemplation, Ellina chanced to encounter his eye intently fixed upon her; the expression of which bespeaking at once pity and benevolence, her heart, mortified, reproached her for her lightness. How vain, how giddy he thinks me! it whispered. Her mirth vanished—no longer had she the power of shining in the little hemisphere of her glory.

Douglas changed his station, to withdraw himself, as the night advanced, from the crowd which