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Rh he now resumed for me, the penitence he now exprest for what the impatience of his jealousy had made him act, at length won me to forgive him, and endeavour to compose myself. It is now ten years since this affair happened, and time, as it decays all things, has deprived my griefs of their former poignancy. In compliance with my vow, however, I devote an hour every day to the memory of Lorenzo, in this recess, which is the repository of all that now remains of him. Lawrana was, some time after the discovery, released of her confinement, and permitted to attend me as formerly: she is very often my companion in this sad employment, and we join the mournful accents of our sighs for poor Lorenzo's fate. The decorum of the world, the love I bear my children, whose interest it is I should live well with their father, oblige me to feign a forgetfulness, as much as possible, of what is past; and the real tenderness which I believe he now again feels for me, makes him omit nothing which may induce me to return it. Thus is the secret of our misfortune concealed from all who know us; you are the only person intruded with it, and I depend wholly on your honour for the preserving it.

Here she ceased: and the other, after assuring her that she never would reveal one syllable of what she had said, told her, she was amazed how she could wear a look of so much serenity, when it could not be but that her heart must be all confusion and disorder. Custom, replied she, renders all things easy; even, dissimulation, to which my nature was ever most averse, by a long habitude I am now grown perfect in; besides, it is no inconsiderable lightening to the weight of my afflictions, that I give a loose to them in this closet. My mind, disburthened of the pressing anguish by the vent I give it in tears, and in complainings here, has something of an unaffected chearfulness when I forsake this scene of horror. You see, therefore, Miramillia, that there are woes in the world, of a nature infinitely