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258 a wide range, and not with him does their suffering end. I saw too much of Charles Stuart at Paris ever to wish him on the throne of his ancestors. His undignified and profligate exile—needy suitor to-day to the only heiress of the royal French blood, and to-morrow to one of the nieces of the Italian adventurer, Mazarin. Utterly neglectful of what he owes to the kingdom which he hopes to regain, Charles has learned but adversity's worst lesson—expediency. He inherits his nature from his mother—worthy descendant of the subtle Medici,—selfish, indolent, ungrateful, and false. He will look on our fair country but as the treasury of an idle and dissipated court. I, for one, will forsake land, heritage, and home, rather than swear fealty to Charles Stuart."

"What do you do, lingering there?" demanded Henry Cromwell of the page who had loitered in the room. "Leave us, and wait in the ante-chamber."

The page obeyed in silence, and left the closet; and the friends pursued their discourse, one of them little aware how carefully his words had been recorded. It was far advanced in the night before they separated; but almost every arrangement had been made for their future proceedings. It is curious to note, that amid the schemings of