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342 and firmly; ‘Madame Serrano will be here to-night; I must see her alone.’

“I stooped down; I kissed his death-cold forehead and obeyed him. You know the rest. That night my brother arrived. The next night I went—Rupert had died alone! Madame Serrano had not arrived. When the servant went in the morning to see him, he found his master was dead.

“I have dwelt on these things to prove to you how little a woman’s life can be judged either for good or ill by the world in general. It was not headlong passion, but presumptuous self-reliance, which has been my bane. That part of God’s will which particularly concerned me, submission to a solitary and unloved life, I had revolted against, and the whole scope and result of that period, in which I was the servant of my own desires, was a proof of this. A life which has not its root in obedience to God, may be fair and apparently healthy, but it has no vitality; it is like those nosegays which the Florentine flower-girls offer you in their green Cascine, and which look brilliant and blooming, but each flower has been cut close to the blossom, and fastened on a dry stick, and it fades and perishes immediately. You may deduce this moral from my life. One can solve the enigma of human destiny with one answer alone—Resignation. When the human will unites itself, in obedience, to the Supreme and Divine will, from struggle is obtained victory, and it enters at once, according to Bossuet’s magnificent expression, among the Powers of God.

“You see, my friend, for friend you are, I am different from what has been thought of me. My life, like that of many women, bears a strange resemblance to this memorial which I send to you to keep for my sake. It is a triptych, painted by Francia. Outwardly, it seems nothing but a jewelled case, as are often the prosperous externals of our conventional life. You open it. On one side is the ‘Virgin and Child,”Child,’ [sic] on the other, the ‘Virgin by the Cross.’ How often has it made me think not only of the wondrous mystery of our Redemption, but (not profanely let me whisper it), of woman’s fate also. So do we all bear a love in our hearts, or on our bosoms (let us call it what we will, love, friendship, motherly, or sisterly love), a pure, childlike, immortal love, born, as we deem it, for the most god-like destiny; and, alas! how often do we not also stand by, and see it, when full grown to man’s estate, crucified, dying, dead? The third phase, the centre, the glorified fruition, how few attain! I go to Rome to my duty—it is a forlorn hope—as such, I shrink from it less. But whatever may be my future fate, I will not forget your kindness. My life is, and has been, sufficiently lonely, for me to prize its few pleasures. There is so much to be done, to be learned, that I am less unhappy than you think.

“I know one thing, certainly, that if I were to die this instant, and meet Rupert face to face, before God, my affection towards him would need no purifying change. There is a consolation to me in this thought. Would I could feel as clearly innocent towards others. From the beginning my life has been wrong. I have been pure in thought and deed, and yet how erring. Submission to the will of God, patience in bearing trials which had been inflicted upon me, resignation, were all wanting. We can never be truly happy, till we learn to be content with unhappiness. To will, to know, to dare, is but half our duty in this world. To yield, to forego, to endure, complete the circle. The laws of society are at fault in much that affects the destiny of woman, I know—and when these laws are brought more into conformity with good sense and true religion, the fate of women will be externally happier; but the war we all have is not so much with the foes without, as with that deadliest foe within ourselves, the Self of each. We ought not to seek to embroider the tapestry of our lives according to our own will, but according to a divine pattern. I was right to choose my self-imposed exile, in preference to the danger of sin; it was not right afterwards to refuse to return to my husband. I have been humbled to the dust, and I may now do better.

“I am writing to you alone, and with this letter concludes the second phase of my life. I shall often think of you. Every good, every evil hour, before it passes away, digs its own grave, and prepares its own mourner. I will remember you always, and it is well for me I have known you. I have had a greater faith in the unselfishness of human nature since. But I must now close this record of faults, errors, and sufferings. I would say judge me leniently; but no, judge me truly. Proud Spirit be still, strong Heart surrender, impatient Will, learn to endure!

“Let me hear from you often. Our lives flow in such different channels that absence will gradually produce its usual effect. Believe me, you will change. But you have touched me too nearly in one of the fatal moments of my life, not to retain a place in my grateful regard. I shall still continue to serve the cause to which Rupert bound me. It is a holy one! Farewell, and God bless you.”

What I felt on reading this letter may be imagined. I loved her, and have loved none since.

Three years later, I received a packet from Rome, addressed to Walter Seymour. It contained the bracelet. Under the word Volere was inscribed, in small letters, Rinunziare—under,under [sic] Sapere, Obbedire, under Ardire, Soffrire. Santa Rabenfels had died in Rome.

Many years have passed since then, and I have lived through the grief which then bowed me to the earth; but her memory is not wholly submerged beneath the sea of my present life, its priceless pearl is an ever new treasure and delight. I think of her, I think I see her, I fancy I hear her speak, and my life is evermore enriched by the unspeakable boon of having known and valued her. From her I have learned the widest indulgence for others, the severest judgment for myself. When I hear women condemned, slandered, belied, I throw myself into the breach to defend them. I remember her,—like her they may be innocent, like her they may have been wronged. When my heart would weep tears of blood, when I think she is dead, and that one of the noblest of God’s creatures was cut off ere her sad incomplete life had apparently found its fulfilment, I correct myself. There was