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"O! would I might chastise that cruel, foolish, discourteous Julienne," exclaimed Mathilde, with affected anger. Now, I will warrant she pretends to doubt her lover's fidelity,-well, how rejoice she is no friend of mine. Good Camille, see you charge Henri to bid adieu to so ungracious a mistress without loss of time."

"That is the only mission I would refuse to undertake for the Lady Mathilde," replied Camille, smiling.

"De Valori," said the Countess, abruptly, regarding him at the same instant with a searching glance, “De Valori, have not evil reports, embodying somewhat of truth, disparaged your friend's fidelity?"

Mathilde

"Yes," replied Camille frankly, regarding the Countess in his turn with equal steadiness of gaze. looked aghast at this confession.

Adele-but it is impossible to describe how she looked. "Yes," resumed Camille, with the same manly simplicity, "those evil reports embodied somewhat of truth, and yet Henry was faithful. The late wars called him to Italy; there, as elsewhere, he proclaimed his lady's beauty in every tourney, and in battle he used no other war-cry than her name. In sooth, that gentle sound was heard in many a deadly fray, and heard to bitter purpose. But Henri was cheered by no message or mark of favour in return; and when wounds obliged him to forego steel and steed, for a weary couch and the leech's drugs, his heart could bear up no longer and so when he heard rumours that the Lady Julienne was

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about to bestow her hand on one of his many rivals, he determined to exchange his solitude for the masque and festival. He did so with returning health, and fluttered awhile the gayest and most miserable of men. Nay, he went further he strove to forget, and he desired to love again, if not with love like that which had once formed the sunlight of his existence, at least, with such as might guard his heart from dark and evil passions ;-but did he succeed? No, no, no,-Adele, dearest Adele ! the vain effort to recover freedom did but manifest the strength of the passion he strove to subdue: the struggle to break his chain, did but tighten its coils; and if ever eye, or smile, or glance, or tone, awoke his admiration for a moment, it was only from some fancied resemblance they bore to Julienne's. Judge, then, of his rapture, when, during his stay at Milan, he received, wholly without expectation, a token of kindness from one so far distant! Judge, too, of his dismay, when on hastening home, elated by the sudden revival of his hopes, Julienne denied him her presence, and that without assigning a cause!"

Camille ceased, and the whole party remained silent for some minutes. Each was embarrassed, on the account of another. Camille, notwithstanding the sore trials his Countess had made him endure, was of that noble loving nature which prefers suffering pain to inflicting it, and pain it was easy to see his petit coute had inflicted; and poor Camille looked at Adele with a

very complex feeling of reverence, anxiety, and affection, mingled with a half-doubting kind of hope.

Mathilde paid the penalty consequent upon unauthorised interference in affairs which do not belong to us; and secretly determined to give up managing lovers for the future. Mathilde looked at her friend with anxiety little short of Camille's, but her hopes of a favourable issue were stronger.

Adele was, after all, the person most to be pitied. She felt she had behaved with unkindness and injustice, yet scarcely liked, or rather scarcely knew how to make the admission; but where the contest is only between love and pride, it is easy to guess which will prove triumphant. "At least," said she, stretching out her hand to her cavalier, "I am bound in courtesy to invite you to the chateau, after your long absence, both as a neighbour and a friend, let us return thither." Mathilde sprang up in an ecstasy. Camille crimsoned with emotion.The former, on some cunningly devised pretext, soon left

her companions to pursue their way alone. Their progress was delayed by no apparent cause, and yet by some strange fatality, they did not reach the chateau till double the length of time had elapsed that was requisite for the walk. Mathilde rallied them on the supposed interesting discoveries made by the way: in reply, Adele blushed, and Camille smiled; and a month afterwards, blush and smile were both interpreted in a way satisfactory to all parties. It is but justice to state, that Adele, as a wife,

amply repaid Camille for all his sufferings as a lover, and that Mathilde being no longer required as peacemaker, from the fact of their being no quarrels, found leisure to get married herself.

SONNET.

BY EDWARD MOXON.

FAREWELL, gay France! My pilgrimage hath end:
Yet will I oft in thought return to thee,

Fair land of mirth, of smiles, and courtesy ;
Where every grace of polished life doth blend.
Rude Scotia's gentle Queen, I now forgive,

And understand, her parting tears; my mind Shapes her fair form on the rough deck reclined, Far hence from France, and known delights, to live; Bidding to all she loved a last adieu.

Well might her then unspotted spirit stay,

And gaze, till hope grew faint, while died away Those happy shores; as now I do review,

Gay land, those pleasures flown, leaving thy shore; Perchance, like her, to breathe thy joys no more.

THE VIOLET.

WHY better than the lady rose

Love I this little flower?

Because its fragrant leaves are those
I loved in childhood's hour.

Tho' many a flower may win my praise,
The violet has my love;

I did not pass my childish days
In garden or in grove:

My garden was the window-seat,

Upon whose edge was set

A little vase, the fair, the sweet,—

It was the violet.

It was my pleasure and my pride;-
How I did watch its growth!

For health and bloom, what plans I tried,
And often injured both.

I placed it in the summer shower,

I placed it in the sun;

And ever, at the evening hour,

My work seemed half undone.

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