Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 3.djvu/205

 have I paid for it. My only chance of victory over myself was flight from you, after I had given the irrevocable sentence; by not doing so, the poison has again found its way to my heart. I feel that I love you; that I cannot have you; and that death, very shortly, must terminate my intolerable sufferings."

This affecting address pierced me to the soul; and now the consequences of my guilt and duplicity rushed upon me like a torrent through a bursting flood-gate. I would have resigned Emily, I would have fled with Eugenia to some distant country, and buried our sorrows in each other's bosoms; and, in a state of irrepressible emotion, I proposed this step to her.

"What do I hear, my beloved?" said she, (starting up with horror from the couch on which she was sitting, with her face between her knees,) "what! is it you that would resign home, friends, character, the possession of a