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316 sacred to me, and taking vows in a faith I held to be false. "A brain fever kept me to my bed for some weeks: I hope and pray that its influence was upon me before. My hand trembles so that I can scarcely write. "Beatrice came to the convent; our intercourse was permitted; and she was kind, gentle, affectionate, to me, as if she had been my sister. I cannot tell you how loving her softened my heart. At length I heard her history. She told me of trials and hardships that put my complainings to shame; and then I learnt that she was the beloved and betrothed of Edward Lorraine. I looked in her beautiful face, and then, strange as it may seem to say, hope, for the first time, wholly abandoned me. My love had been so dreaming, that my imagination, even in the convent, was always shaping out some improbable reunion.

"I was ill again. Beatrice watched me, soothed me, read to me from the little English Bible which she said had ever been, in her trying and lonely life, a friend and a support. Alas! my heart died within me to think what account I should render of the talent committed to my charge. I felt utterly lost and cast