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 gloss it over as you will with esteem, regard, and professions;—or whether you had found that you, also, had a soul, before mine was laid open to you. No evasion—no delay!" continued she, with augmenting impetuosity; "you have promised to grant my boon,—speak, Harleigh, speak!—was it my direful fate, or your insuperable antipathy?"

"It was surely not antipathy!" cried he, in a tone the most soothing; yet with a look affrighted, and unconscious, till he had spoken, of the inference to which his words might be liable.

"I thank you!" cried she, fervently, "Harleigh, I thank you! This, at least, is noble; this is treating me with distinction, this is honouring me with trust. It abates the irritating tinglings of mortified pride; it persuades me I am the victim of misfortune, not of contempt."

Suddenly, then, turning to Ellis, whose eyes, during the whole scene, had seemed rivetted to the floor, she expressively added, "I ask not the object!"