hope in solitude. Every trace of the recent storm had passed away, the young buds were wooing the sunbeams, and the viewless cuckoo lifted up its voice from afar. All that fell upon the ear, and all that met the eye, contributed to melt the soul to tenderness. My thoughts were of Catherine, and I now thought how I should unbosom before her my whole heart; or, I fancied her by my side, her fair face beaming smiles on mine, her lips whispering music. My spirit became entranced—it was filled with her image. With my arms folded upon my bosom, I was wandering thus unconsciously along a footpath in the wood, when I was aroused by the exclamation—

'Edward!'

It was my Catherine. I started as though a disembodied spirit had met me on my path. Her agitation was not less than mine. I stepped forward—I would have clasped her to my bosom—but resolution forsook me—her presence awed me—I hesitated and faltered—

'Miss Forrester!'

I had never called her by any other name; but, as she afterwards told me, the word then went to her heart, and she thought, 'He cares not for me, and I am lost!' Would to Heaven that such had ever remained her thoughts, and your friend would have been less guilty and less wretched than he this day is!

I offered her my arm, and we walked onward together; but we spoke not to each other—we could not speak. Each had a thousand things to say, but they were all unutterable. A stifled sigh escaped from her bosom, and mine responded to it. We had approached within a quarter of a mile of her father's house. Still we were both silent. I trembled—I stood suddenly still.

'Catherine!' I exclaimed, and my eyes remained fixed upon the ground—my bosom laboured in agony—I struggled for words, and, at length, added, 'I cannot return to your father's—Catherine, I cannot!'

'Edward!' she cried, 'whither—whither would you go?—you would not leave me thus? What means this?'

'Means! Catherine!' returned I—'are ye not to be another's? Would that I had died before I had looked upon thy face, and my soul was lighted with a fleeting joy, only that the midnight of misery might sit down on it for ever!'

'Oh, speak not thus!' she cried, and her gentle form shook as a blighted leaf in an autumnal breeze; 'speak not language unfit for you to utter or me to hear. Come, dear Edward!'

'Dear Edward!' I exclaimed, and my arms fell upon her neck—'that word has recalled me to myself! Dear Edward!—repeat those words again!—let the night-breeze whisper them, and bear them on its wings for ever! Tell me, Catherine, am I indeed dear to you?'

She burst into tears, and hid her face upon my bosom.

'Edward!' she sobbed, 'let us leave this place—I have said too much—let us return home.'

'No, loved one!' resumed I; 'if you have said too much, we part now, and eternity may not unite us! Farewell, Catherine!—be happy! Bear my thanks to your father, and say—but, no, no!—say nothing,—let not the wretch he has honoured with his friendship blast his declining years! Farewell, love!' I pressed my lips upon her snowy brow, and again I cried—'Farewell!'

'You must not—shall not leave me!' she said, and trembled; while her fair hands grasped my arm.

'Catherine,' added I, 'can I see you another's? The thought chokes me! Would you have me behold it?—shall my eyes be withered by the sight? Never, never! Forgive me!—Catherine, forgive me! I have acted rashly, perhaps cruelly; but I would not have spoken as I have done—I would have fled from your presence—I would not have given one pang to your gentle bosom—your father should not have said that he sheltered a scorpion that turned and stung him; but, meeting you as I have done to-day, I could no longer suppress the tumultuous feelings that struggled in my bosom. But it is past. Forgive me—forget me!'

Still memory hears her sighs, as her tears fell upon my bosom, and, wringing her hands in bitterness, she cried—

'Say not, forget you! If, in compliance with my father's will, I must give my hand to another, and if to him my vows must be plighted, I will keep them sacred—yet my heart is yours!'

Lewis! I was delirious with joy, as I listened to this confession from her lips. The ecstasy of years was compressed into a moment of deep, speechless, almost painful luxury. We mingled our tears together, and our vows went up to heaven a sacrifice pure as the first that ascended, when the young earth offered up its incense from paradise to the new-born sun.

I remained beneath her father's roof until within three days of the time fixed for her becoming the bride of Sir Peter Blakely. Day by day, I beheld my Catherine move to and fro like a walking corpse—pale, speechless, her eyes fixed and lacking their lustre. Even I seemed unnoticed by her. She neither sighed nor wept. A trance had come over her faculties. She made no arrangements for her bridal; and when I at times whispered to her that she should be mine! O Lewis! she would then smile—but it was a smile where the light of the soul was not—more dismal, more vacant than the laugh of idiotcy! Think, then, how unlike they were to the rainbows of the soul which I had seen radiate the countenance of my Catherine!

Sir Peter Blakely had gone into Roxburghshire, to make preparations for taking home his bride, and her father had joined you in Edinburgh, relative to the affairs of Prince Charles, in consequence of a letter which he had received from you, and the contents of which might not even be communicated to me. At any other time, and this lack of confidence would have provoked my resentment; but my thoughts were then of other things, and I heeded it not. Catherine and I were ever together; and for hour succeeding hour we sat silent, gazing on each other. O my friend! could your imagination conjure up our feelings and our thoughts in this hour of trial, you would start, shudder, and think no more. The glance of each was as a pestilence, consuming the other. As the period of her father's return approached, a thousand resolutions crowded within my bosom—some of magnanimity, some of rashness. But I was a coward—morally, I was a coward. Though I feared not the drawn sword nor the field of danger more than another man, yet misery compels me to confess what I was. Every hour, every moment, the sacrifice of parting from her became more painful. Oh! a mother might have torn her infant from her breast, dashed it on the earth, trampled on its outstretched hands, and laughed at its dying screams, rather than that I now could have lived to behold my Catherine another's.

Suddenly, the long, the melancholy charm of my silence broke. I fell upon my knee, and, clenching my hands together, exclaimed—

'Gracious Heaven!—if I be within the pale of thy mercy, spare me this sight! Let me be crushed as an atom—but let not mine eyes see the day when a tongue speaks it, nor mine ears hear the sound that calls her another's.'

I started to my feet, I grasped her hands in frenzy, I exclaimed—'You shall be mine!' I took her hand. 'Catherine!' I added, 'you will not—you SHALL not give your hand to another! It is mine, and from mine it shall not part! And I pressed it to my breast as a mother would her child from the knife of a destroyer.

'It SHALL be yours!' she replied wildly; and the feeling of life and consciousness again gushed through her heart. But she sank on my breast, and sobbed—

'My father! O my father!'

'Your father is Sir Peter Blakely's friend,' replied I, 'and he will not break the pledge he has given him. With his return, Catherine, my hopes and life perish together. Now only can you save yourself—now only can you save me. Fly with me!—be mine, and your father's blessing will not be withheld. Hesitate now, and farewell happiness.'

She hastily raised her head from my breast, she stood proudly before me, and, casting her bright blue eyes upon mine, with a look of piercing inquiry, said—