I must conclude: for though we write best when thoughts flow the most freely, yet at present I find myself more inclined to think than to write. Affectionately and ever A. W. ST. IVES LETTER XLV _Anna Wenbourne St. Ives to Louisa Clifton_ _Chateau de Villebrun_ I know not, Louisa, how to begin! I have an accident to relate which has alarmed me so much that I am half afraid it should equally alarm my friend. Yet the danger is over, and her sensations cannot equal ours. She can but imagine what they were. But it is so incredible, so mad, so dreadful! Clifton is strangely rash! He had been for some days dissatisfied, restless, and disturbed. I knew not why, except that I had desired time for mutual consideration, before I would permit him to speak to Sir Arthur. He has half terrified me from ever permitting him to speak--But then he has more than repaired all the wrong he had done. There is something truly magnanimous in his temper, but it has taken a very erroneous bent. The chief subject of my last was the distance which I observed between him and Frank Henley. Little did I know the reason. But I will not anticipate: only, remember, be not too much alarmed. Frank was but one of the actors, though the true and indeed sole hero of the scene I am going to relate. Indeed he is a wonderful, I had almost said a divine youth! It took birth from the Count de Beaunoir. In my last, I mentioned the strange defiance of the pistols and the handkerchief: and would you think, Louisa, a conversation so frantic could be renewed? It is true it shewed itself under a new though scarcely a less horrible aspect. We were yesterday walking in the park, in which there is a remarkable lake, small but romantic. I before spoke I believe of our rowing on it in boats. We were walking beside it on a steep rock, which continues for a considerable length of way to form one of its banks. The Count and Clifton were before: I, Frank Henley, and a party of ladies and gentlemen were following at a little distance, but not near enough to hear the conversation that was passing between your brother and the Count. It seems the latter had first begun once again to talk of times of knight errantry, and of the feats which the _preux chevaliers_ had performed for their ladies. The headlong Clifton, utterly despising the pretended admiration of what he was persuaded the Count durst in no manner imitate, after some sarcastic expressions of his contempt, madly but seriously asked the Count if he durst jump off the rock into the lake, to prove his own courage. Shew your soul, said he, if you have any! Jump you first, said the Count--! Imagine, Louisa, if you can, the shock I received when, not knowing what had passed, but in an apparent fit of frenzy, I saw him desperately rush to the side of the rock, and dash himself headlong down into the water! It was at an angle, and we had a full view of him falling!