you which now please me, and which I had not remarked. I love your face, I
love your eyes, I love you, I love your mind, I love your good heart; is
this still pity? Why, after having loved you as a friend, do I love you as
a lover? I do not know! Why was I lively and gay when I loved you as a
friend? Why am I all changed since I love you as a lover? I do not know.
Why have I waited so long to find you both handsome and good? to love you
at once with my eyes and my heart? I do not know; or, rather, yes, I do
know: it is because I have discovered how much you loved me without ever
telling it; how much you were generous and devoted. Then love mounted from
my heart to my eyes, like as a soft tear mounts there when one is
affected."

"Really, I think I am in a dream on hearing you talk thus."

"And I, then! I never should have thought it possible that I could dare to
tell you all this; but your despair compelled me! Ah, well! now that you
know that I love you as my friend, as my lover, as my husband, will you
still say it is pity?"

The generous scruples of Germain were dispelled in a moment before this
avowal, so artless and courageous. A joy unlooked--for tore him from his
sorrowful meditations.

"You love me!" cried he. "I believe you; your voice, your look, all tell
me! I do not wish to ask myself how I have deserved such happiness, I
abandon myself to it blindly. My life, my whole life, will not suffice to
pay my debt to you! Ah! I have already suffered much, but this moment
compensates all!"

"At length you are consoled. Oh! I was very sure, very sure I should