Year: 1878

| love you accord to him, cannot even gain
gentle or forgiving word from your lips"


"Do not speak of him" said Mary, with
emotion. "He is far too noble and good to
be lightly mentioned"


"You are infatuated" he rejoined, "and
cannot distinguish gold from dross. You re-
iect true end earnest love as worthless, and
accept, willingly, the offering of worn'out
world.hardened heart, which"


"Hush," interrupted Mary, who was now
trembling, her. fair face all in glow with ex-
citement and anger, such as it had never
worn before. II auiN not hear you utter one
insinuation against him. He is as far above
you in principle, in all high and noble quail
ties, as the stars are above the earth, and ev'
cry syllable you speak in slander of him is a
personal insult to me-"


"You are very fond of that word insult" )"
replied Maurice. GAS to slander, have said
one word against the character of this Chew
alier Bayard, sons peur ct sans reprocte, that
you should turn so 6ercely upon me? l sim
ply said that heart made callous by con-
tact with the world, by disappointment, by
blighted love, could not be fairly given in ex-
change for heart pure and fresh, and un'
tainted, like yours"


"What do you mean by blighted love ?
asked Mary, startled into the inquiry by the
unexpectedness of this accusation.


"What! Have you never heard that story
of his youth-how he pined, in vain, for one
of whom he was passienately fond, even all
through his miserable, disappointing welded
life ; how she died in a foreign land, and how
her memory has never ceased to be unspeak-
ably dear to him ? Look at the picture that
hangs over the cabinet by the fireplace, and
ask him, when you see him again, to tell you
its history. Then look in your own heart, and
find out whether you are willing to 6ll the
post of a latter.dsy comforter; substitute
for the lost love he has never forgotten"


"If all this is true" said Mary, who had
recovered her former dignity while she spoke,
lit is no taint upon his character no cause of
reproach, or of any change in my regard. 1t
only serves to lower you in my opinion, that
you should try to farther your own cause by
endeavoring to lower my opinion Of him.
Must ask you again to make room for me to
pass, or will you rudely persist in keeping me
out here against my expressed desire%


go, then," said Maurice, with an outburst
of anger which he could not control, as he
moved aside to let her 60 past. "Since you
have nothing but scorn and reproach to offer
me, it is certainly useless for me to attempt to
detain you longer but the day may yet come
when you will look back on your conduct to
me with regret, and wish that you had de-
cided differently"


To this Mary deigned no reply but with a
lofty carriage, quite foreign to her, entered
the house and sought her own room, upstairs.
She did not perceive, as she passed through
the library, that Adelia was sitting within the
clrtained recess, id a position to hear, through
the raised sash of one of the narrow windows,
every word that had been uttered by Maurice
and by herself.


Adelia had heard, and the malignant look
with which she followed Mary, as she crossed
the apartment, seemed to indicate that the
revelation, thus made to her, of the existence
of state of affairs she had not before dream.
ed Of was one which caused her anything but
pleasure or satisfaction.