well-being. But, hardly had she analyzed and acknowledged this sensation
when she reproached herself for harboring it when she was about to cause
Claudet such affliction.

Poor Claudet! what a cruel blow was in store for him! He was so
guilelessly in love, and had such unbounded confidence in the success of
his projects! Reine was overcome by tender reminiscences. She had
always experienced, as if divining by instinct the natural bonds which
united them, a sisterly affection for Claudet. Since their earliest
infancy, at the age when they learned their catechism under the church
porch, they had been united in a bond of friendly fellowship. With
Reine, this tender feeling had always remained one of friendship, but,
with Claudet, it had ripened into love; and now, after allowing the poor
young fellow to believe that his love was reciprocated, she was forced to
disabuse him. It was useless for her to try to find some way of
softening the blow; there was none. Claudet was too much in love to
remain satisfied with empty words; he would require solid reasons; and
the only conclusive one which would convince him, without wounding his
self-love, was exactly the one which the young girl could not give him.
She was, therefore, doomed to send Claudet away with the impression that
he had been jilted by a heartless and unprincipled coquette. And yet
something must be done. The grand chasserot had been too long already in
the toils; there was something barbarously cruel in not freeing him from
his illusions.

In this troubled state of mind, Reine gazed appealingly at the silent
witnesses of her distress. She heard a voice within her saying to the
tall, vaulted ash, "Inspire me!" to the little rose-colored centaurea of
the wayside, "Teach me a charm to cure the harm I have done!" But the
woods, which in former days had been her advisers and instructors,