into all who conversed with him. It was this holy man to whom
Constantia had determined to apply herself in confession, though
neither she nor any other, besides the prior of the convent, knew
anything of his name or family. The gay, the amiable Theodosius had
now taken upon him the name of Father Francis, and was so far
concealed in a long beard, a shaven head, and a religious habit,
that it was impossible to discover the man of the world in the
venerable conventual.

As he was one morning shut up in his confessional, Constantia
kneeling by him opened the state of her soul to him; and after
having given him the history of a life full of innocence, she burst
out into tears, and entered upon that part of her story in which he
himself had so great a share. "My behaviour," says she, "has, I
fear, been the death of a man who had no other fault but that of
loving me too much. Heaven only knows how dear he was to me whilst
he lived, and how bitter the remembrance of him has been to me since
his death." She here paused, and lifted up her eyes that streamed
with tears towards the father, who was so moved with the sense of
her sorrows that he could only command his voice, which was broken
with sighs and sobbings, so far as to bid her proceed. She followed
his directions, and in a flood of tears poured out her heart before
him. The father could not forbear weeping aloud, insomuch that, in
the agonies of his grief, the seat shook under him. Constantia, who
thought the good man was thus moved by his compassion towards her,
and by the horror of her guilt, proceeded with the utmost contrition
to acquaint him with that vow of virginity in which she was going to
engage herself, as the proper atonement for her sins, and the only
sacrifice she could make to the memory of Theodosius. The father,
who by this time had pretty well composed himself, burst out again