'This is the most awful moment of my life,' said Adeline. 'And the most anxious one of mine,' replied Glenmurray. 'If Mrs Mowbray forgives you, it will be probably on condition that--' 'Whatever be the conditions, I must accept them,' said Adeline. 'True,' returned Glenmurray, wiping the cold dews of weakness from his forehead: 'but no matter--at any rate, I should not have been with you long.' Adeline, with a look of agony, pressed the arm she held to her bosom. Glenmurray's heart smote him immediately--he felt he had been ungenerous; and, while the hectic of a moment passed across his cheek, he added, 'But I do not do myself justice in saying so. I believe my best chance of recovery is the certainty of your being easy. Let me but see you happy, and so disinterested is my affection, as I have often told you, that I shall cheerfully assent to any thing that may ensure your happiness.' 'And can you think,' answered Adeline, 'that my happiness can be independent of yours? Do you not see that I am only trying to prepare my mind for being called upon to surrender my inclinations to my duty?' At this moment they found themselves at the door of the hotel. Neither of them spoke; the moment of trial was come; and both were unable to encounter it firmly. At last Adeline grasped her lover's hand, bade him wait for her at the end of the street, and with some degree of firmness she entered the vestibule, and asked for Dr Norberry. Dr Norberry, meanwhile, with the best intentions in the world, had but ill prepared Mrs Mowbray's mind for the intended visit. He had again talked to her of her daughter; and urged the propriety of forgiving her; but he had at the same time renewed his animadversions on her own conduct. 'You know not, Dr Norberry,' observed Mrs Mowbray, 'the pains I took with the education of that girl; and I expected to be repaid for it by being styled the happiest as well as best of mothers.' 'And so you would, perhaps, had you not wished to be a wife as well as mother.' 'No more on that subject, sir,' haughtily returned Mrs Mowbray.--'Yes, --Adeline was indeed my joy, my pride.' 'Aye, and pride will have a fall; and a pretty tumble yours has had, to be sure, my old friend; and it has broke its knees--never to be sound again.' At this unpropitious moment 'a lady to Dr Norberry' was announced, and Adeline tottered into the room. 'What strange intrusion is this?' cried Mrs Mowbray: 'who is this woman?' Adeline threw back her veil, and falling on her knees, stretched out her arms in an attitude of entreaty: speak she could not, but her countenance was sufficiently expressive of her meaning; and her pale sunk cheek spoke forcibly to the heart of her mother.--At this moment, when a struggle which might have ended favourably for Adeline was taking place in the mind of Mrs Mowbray, Dr Norberry injudiciously exclaimed, 'There,--there she is! Look at her, poor soul! There is little fear, I think, of her ever rivalling you again.'