hand opened to all,--the humble as the proud, the oppressed as the
oppressor, to the woman as to the lords of the earth,--she found a haven
for all the doubts she had known, and for the despair which of late had
darkened the face of earth. Her home lost, the deep and beautiful love
of her youth blighted,--that was a creed almost irresistible which told
her that grief was but for a day, that happiness was eternal. Far, too,
from revolting such of the Hebrew pride of association as she had formed,
the birth of the Messiah in the land of the Israelites seemed to
consummate their peculiar triumph as the Elected of Jehovah. And while
she mourned for the Jews who persecuted the Saviour, she gloried in those
whose belief had carried the name and worship of the descendants of David
over the furthest regions of the world. Often she perplexed and startled
the worthy Inez by exclaiming, "This, your belief, is the same as mine,
adding only the assurance of immortal life--Christianity is but the
Revelation of Judaism."

The wise and gentle instrument of Leila's conversion did not, however,
give vent to those more Catholic sentiments which might have scared away
the wings of the descending dove. She forbore too vehemently to point
out the distinctions of the several creeds, and rather suffered them to
melt insensibly one into the other: Leila was a Christian, while she
still believed herself a Jewess. But in the fond and lovely weakness of
mortal emotions, there was one bitter thought that often and often came
to mar the peace that otherwise would have settled on her soul. That
father, the sole softener of whose stern heart and mysterious fates she
was, with what pangs would he receive the news of her conversion! And
Muza, that bright and hero-vision of her youth--was she not setting the
last seal of separation upon all hope of union with the idol of the
Moors? But, alas! was she not already separated from him, and had not
their faiths been from the first at variance? From these thoughts she