much mistaken."

Here, the reader may think, it would have been proper for me to have
told her that she was a worthless girl, who might go to the deuce for
all I cared; but if such is his opinion, it is not, and was not, mine. I
shall not set down all the talk between us; it was beating the air on my
side, and a steady trampling of solid earth on hers. My final argument,
and that only, produced a certain effect upon this remarkably clear-
headed girl. I told her that part of my story which dealt with Aurelia's
perfections and my own disastrous imperfections; I made her understand
that I was not the inexperienced man she had thought me; rather, I was
one with two examples ever before him--one shining with the pure
effulgence of Heaven, the other harsh, staring, horrible, like some
baleful fire at sea. "Ah, Virginia," I concluded, "you must not misjudge
me. It is a sinner who speaks to you, not a saint removed too far to
help you. A sinner indeed am I, yet not utterly lost. I have a guide, a
hope, a haven; I have a light whereby I may steer my poor barque.
Aurelia Lanfranchi--no! let me call her by her own name--Aurelia
Gualandi will save my soul alive. Oh, let her example be yours--and her
excellence your means of excellence!"

Virginia, I say, was struck by these moving words of mine. She hung her
head and seemed sunk in thought.

"I know nothing of this lady, nor of her nation," she said, more gently
than before, "but what you say of her pleases me very much. Evidently
you love her, and she you. But you must allow me to tell you now, what I
was timid to say before, that she showed much good sense in putting you
in the cupboard, and you remarkably little in jumping out of it. Half an
hour more cupboard and your learned doctor had been asleep. Next day you