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desert, a thorny wilderness, his future, with such associates as Emily and Selina, a paradise visited by angels. "Yes," said he, to his enraptured consort, halcyon days await us. It is only now I truly begin to live."

CHAP. XXXIII.

O had I fall'n

Turning with fatal arm the tide of battle!
But thus to perish by a villain's hand,
Cut off from nature's and from glory's course,
Which never mortal was so fond to run !-

HOME.

THOUGH the intrepidity which had often supported Lord Avondel in battle prevented him from fearing the issue of his interview with Monthermer, the events of the day had too deeply affected him to allow him to sleep. He hoped, he was persuaded, he should be able to assuage the general's fury, which he supposed origi

nated from his having heard the common rumour of his intimacy with Paulina: yet, to meet a man whom he had injured (and putting the case as his own, could he conceal from himself that he had injured Monthermer ?) to hope for at best a partial vindication of his own conduct, to know that he had tampered with the affections of a married woman, and actually tottered on the verge of committing one of the foulest crimes, for which he must either apologize or deny his own actions, were sufficient to stretch a mind endued with such moral susceptibility on the rack of torture, and to make him anticipate the morning with more of dread and horror than he ever experienced in the front of an hostile army.

He rose very early, and in passing the nursery heard the cries of his little son. "Some infantine distress,'

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thought he " oppresses him, which his immature organs are unable to ask us to relieve. It is however the distress of innocence. From what motive springs mine? Why at this unusual hour do I steal from my own dwelling, avoiding the eye of my servants, and tortured

by an anguish which I cannot communicate ?"

He found the general waiting at the appointed rendezvous. A night devoted to intemperance had rendered him still more sanguinary, and absolutely deaf to every attempt at explanation. He commended Avondel's honour in bringing no one to interrupt business, and throwing off his coat, told him he was ready to begin. The earl answered he was unarmed. Monthermer branded him with the name of coward, and Avondel confessed he did fear to violate those laws

which his station called upon him to defend.

"You should have thought of this," said Monthermer, "when you broke the ties of honour and friendship, and attempted to bring disgrace and miseinto my family."

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"General Monthermer," returned Lord Avondel, with solemn earnestness, "according to that low estimate of principle which satisfies ordinary minds, I could deny your charge, but I will own that I feel myself a culprit, and I give you a superiority which I never before acceded to man, by asking you to pardon an intentional offence. I have trifled with the affections of Lady Paulina, but this is all my crime."

"This is not all," returned the infuriated husband. "You must publicly

acknowledge your baseness in defaming the virtue you could not corrupt."

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