hour, to confide to me her love, and to tell me positively that she will
die if she does not obtain the object of her desire; that, for more than
a year, a secret intercourse has kept up the ardour of their love; and
that they had even pledged themselves to marry each other when their
passion was new.

SGAN. Oh, the wretched girl!

ISA. That, being informed of the despair into which I had plunged the
man whom she loves to see, she came to beg me to allow her to prevent a
departure which would break her heart; to meet this lover to-night under
my name, in the little street on which my room looks, where
counterfeiting my voice, she may utter certain tender feelings, and
thereby tempt him to stay; in short, cleverly to secure for herself the
regard which it is known he has for me.

SGAN. And do you think this...

ISA. I? I am enraged at it. "What," said I, "sister, are you mad? Do you
not blush to indulge in such a love for one of those people who change
every day? To forget your sex, and betray the trust put in you by the
man whom Heaven has destined you to marry?"

SGAN. He deserves it richly; I am delighted by it.

ISA. Finally my vexation employed a hundred arguments to reprove such
baseness in her, and enable me to refuse her request for to-night; but
she became so importunate, shed so many tears, heaved so many sighs,
said so often that I was driving her to despair if I refused to gratify
her passion, that my heart was brought to consent in spite of me; and,