Mr. Pelly stopped despairingly. "Half a page gone! We must remain unenlightened--as well as on a good many other points. There is not very much more. I may as well finish:-- "'How great my happiness has been with my Maddalena you, _Illustrissima_, may know from your most illustrious father, who has known of me throughout. Life is made up of good and ill, and what right has one so truly blessed as I have been to complain of the cruelty of Fate in depriving him of his right hand and its power of work? Think of what his lot is to him to whom night and day alike give the sun in heaven to his soul! Contrast it with that of the sated blow-fly, of the world-compelling tyrant, at whose pleasure are all the contents, at choice, of all the world's treasure-houses, except Love. That is the one thing wealth cannot buy, that the behests of kings command in vain! And that has been mine, in all its fulness; a fruit whose sweetness has no compeer, a jewel whose light mirrors back the glow that shines for ever in the eyes of God....' The reader paused, for there was an interruption from without. "What on earth _can_ it be, at this time of night? I'm sure it's a carriage this time! Do look out and see--oh no! go on and let's have the rest. It can only be the General--he changed his mind, and his train was late. We shall see in a minute--let's have the last page...." This was collective speech, which ended when Mr. Pelly said, "There isn't very much." He went on reading rapidly, subject to a sense of advent elsewhere in the house: