me; and you would rather pine away and die than suffer me to lose one
of those worldly advantages which are in my eyes but as dust in the
balance,--it is in vain to deny it. I heard from others of your
impaired health; I have witnessed it myself. Do you remember last
night, when you were in the room with your relations, and they made
you sing,--a song too which you used to sing to me, and when you came
to the second stanza your voice failed you, and you burst into tears,
and they, instead of soothing, reproached and chid you, and you
answered not, but wept on? Isabel, do you remember that a sound was
heard at the window and a groan? Even they were startled, but they
thought it was the wind, for the night was dark and stormy, and they
saw not that it was I: yes, my devoted, my generous love, it was I who
gazed upon you, and from whose heart that voice of anguish was wrung;
and I saw your cheek was pale and thin, and that the canker at the
core had preyed upon the blossom.

Think you, after this, that I could keep silence or obey your request?
No, dearest, no! Is not my happiness your object? I have the vanity
to believe so; and am I not the best judge how that happiness is to be
secured? I tell you, I say it calmly, coldly, dispassionately,--not
from the imagination, not even from the heart, but solely from the
reason,--that I can bear everything rather than the loss of you; and
that if the evil of my love scathe and destroy you, I shall consider
and curse myself as your murderer! Save me from this extreme of
misery, my--yes, my Isabel! I shall be at the copse where we have so
often met before, to-morrow, at noon. You will meet me; and if I
cannot convince you, I will not ask you to be persuaded. A. M.

And Isabel read this letter, and placed it at her heart, and felt less
miserable than she had done for months; for, though she wept, there