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But the relation of Lucia threw too clear and

indubitable a light upon the subject.

Aline at that unseemly hour, lurking in such suspicious locality: Oh, it was all too clearly proved!

The route of the fugitives to London, having been ascertained, the distracted father, and the raving lover started in pursuit.

The company hurriedly dispersed, and Lady Adelaide, who had, from the first, shut herself up in her own room, was wholly abandoned to the tender condolences of her sisters.

How grateful she should be, they argued, that the base girl was not her own, that the bad blood, which could alone have incited her to so disgraceful an action, she owed to another mother-a Marchmont would never have so debased herself!

But Lady Adelaide possessed kindly feeling, as well as worldly pride; the anguish she felt on the occasion was divided: she grieved for the fate of her step-daughter, and she smarted

under the idea of the slur, the disadvantage, the stigma, this fatal conduct would cast upon the daughters she had to bring forward in the world.

It was indeed a day of darkness and distress, that into which the hitherto gentle and beloved Aline had plunged her father's house.

The pursuit and its conclusion, we need not repeat.

On his return, Sir Alexander for a whole fortnight, shut himself up in his private apartments, and in this strict solitude he and Lady Adelaide mourned together. None but their children were suffered to approach them; even the servants were, as much as possible, excluded from their presence.

For many months they saw no company, the father no strangers but on business. The iron had truly entered into the strong, stern soul of the statesman.

Children take a parent's love on trust.

"The love of parents has a deep, still

source," though dark and turbid the surface may appear-Distrust it not-Dare not to send

the shaft within, and say, no love is there, to strike!

CHAPTER XIII.

"Know'st thou the land where citrons bloom, and where
The golden orange breathes its fragrant air?

Where winds are ever soft, and blue the skies,
Where myrtles spring, and groves of laurel rise?
Know'st thou that land my love? Away, away!
Oh! might I with thee 'mid its beauty stray ?"

GOETHE.

THEY went to Italy, the Italian and his young bride-to Italy, that land of enchantment, of oblivion, of consolation!

It was new life to Aline - she was wrapped as in a vision-old things seemed to have passed away into forgetfulness-old spheres of existence

-old ties-old affections!

Her husband's

country had become her country-his God her God!

There was nothing to break the spell.

Angelo relinquished all engagements, sacrificed all means of emolument arising from his vocation, to devote himself exclusively to his lovely bride.

To the popular first tenor of a London season, this inaction was at present quite feasible. He had made a little fortune for the present emergency.

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The Russian winter engagement, which he had almost accepted, had been abruptly broken off. Winter-spring and summer, were spent by Aline in love, luxury and enjoyment, as unalloyed as that of any lady of independent lord or gentleman.

The young couple were all in all to one another, and shrunk from society; but yet, from their youth, beauty, talent-and more than all, the mystery cast over them, when by chance thrown

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