gave herself--brave, noble Venice! Oh! if we two were there--Venice has
England's sea-spirit. But, did we not flatter the king? And ask
yourself, my Carlo, could a king move in such an enterprise as a common
person? Ought we not to be in union with Sardinia? How can we be if we
reject her king? Is it not the only positive army that, we can look to--
I mean regular army? Should we not; make some excuses for one who is not
in our position?

"I feel that I push my questions like waves that fall and cannot get
beyond--they crave so for answers agreeing to them. This should make me
doubt myself, perhaps; but they crowd again, and seem so conclusive until
I have written them down. I am unworthy to struggle with your intellect;
but I say to myself, how unworthy of you I should be if I did not use my
own, such as it is! The poor king; had to conclude an armistice to save
his little kingdom. Perhaps we ought to think of that sternly. My heart
is; filled with pity.

"It cannot but be right that you should know the worst; of me. I call
you my husband, and tremble to be permitted to lean my head on your bosom
for hours, my sweet lover! And yet my cowardice, if I had let the king
go by without a reverential greeting from me, in his adversity, would
have rendered me insufferable to myself. You are hearing me, and I am
compelled to say, that rather than behave so basely I would forfeit your
love, and be widowed till death should offer us for God to join us. Does
your face change to me?

"Dearest, and I say it when the thought of you sets me almost swooning.
I find my hands clasped, and I am muttering I know not what, and I am
blushing. The ground seems to rock; I can barely breathe; my heart is
like a bird caught in the hands of a cruel boy: it will not rest. I fear