I had none to whom I could disclose the conflict in my mind. I have said that our preceptress was a weak and frivolous woman; and Dorathea was yet too much of a child to be entrusted with my secret. I should have regarded it as pollution to breathe the name of love in ears so pure and so unsuspecting as hers.

Meanwhile the time passed on. Years were added to years, and still my father was detained in exile; and while I devoted my solitary hours to the care and maintenance of his estate, as well as to the perfecting of Dorathea’s education, my youth ebbed imperceptibly away; and, absorbed by an engrossing interest, I remained unconscious of the gradual decay of my beauty. I knew that I had improved in every quality sanctified by Worsley’s approbation; that I had cultivated each gift and each virtue of his choice; and as to mere personal loveliness, he had seemed to hold it so lightly that I had long become indifferent to its possession.

But although my father’s peculiar position, as well as my own inclinations, determined me to remain buried in the strict seclusion of Wrocksley Court, I own I was gratified by an opportunity afforded, through the kindness of a near relation of my deceased mother, to acquaint my young sister in some slight measure with the diversions of the capital; and scarcely had she departed for London, leaving me to dream away my solitude during her absence, when one evening,—one calm, fragrant, balmy spring evening,—I saw a stranger of noble and familiar aspect advancing along the green alley leading to my garden bower, and in another moment Worsley himself was beside me. The beating of my heart had not misled my expectations. He was the bearer of a letter from my father, authorising him to become our inmate. “Mistress Shirley’s protection,” wrote Lord Herbert, “will be a sanction to Wilmot’s temporary residence at Wrocksley, inasmuch as he is already my son by adoption and affection,—a tie I trust to see eventually confirmed by his marriage with a beloved daughter.” With my father’s letter in my bosom, and Worsley at my side, judge whether I was happy! judge whether the soul-sickness of those long years of absence was repaid!

I could not but observe that Sir Wilmot was duly sensible of the alteration which time, and the chastening of sorrow, had wrought in my disposition; that he regarded me with something of an exulting tenderness, as if conscious of having been instrumental in the change. Nor did my amended prospects and actual happiness tend to recloud my brow, or chill my frank, joyous, yet subdued demeanour. There was not one jarring thought within my mind, one discordant feeling within my heart, as day after day I sat by Worsley’s side beneath the green and shadowy shelter of the Wrocksley beechwoods, listening to his prolonged details of the exiled court, or claiming his interest, in turn, for my descriptions of Dora’s innocent beauty and elegance of mind, or my eager anticipation of my father’s speedy and prosperous return.

One evening, succeeding by many weeks his arrival, while the saloon in which we were sitting was obscured by the creeping summer twilight, and we were indulging in that happy interchange of thought and feeling which summer and twilight render so intimately and sacredly confidential, occasionally interrupting ourselves by a few faint chords of the lute that lay upon my knee, the door of the chamber suddenly flew open, and Dorathea stole into my arms. I started at the sound of her sweet voice,—and so did Worsley, who was seated by my side; but when, beneath the officious lights which were now introduced into the gloomy apartment, Dora’s sylph-like, and pure and tranquil beauty became revealed, he was motionless with delighted surprise. At the first glance I enjoyed his emotion; at the second, an abyss of horror and agony seemed opening at my feet! Amid all the varying expressions I had heretofore recognised on his mutable countenance, I had never detected the rapt, the luxurious ecstasy of admiration which now thrilled from his eyes, and streamed upon his cheek. My future destiny seemed written there in characters of fire.

I seized the first pretext to escape into my own chamber—to rush with frenzied haste to the tiring-mirror on my toilet, and lo! I beheld myself for the first time reflected in the terrible portraiture of truth! Distorted by passion, bewildered by terror, I saw each altered feature withering under the touch of time and prolonged anxiety. I saw my youth faded by the tears I had shed—for him. I saw my quivering lips blanched by the anticipations of those which yet awaited me; while a still small voice reiterated in my ears, “He will forsake thee, Miranda! he will forsake thee!” Oh that I could have recalled my youth, and its disregarded