Roseline, to shake off for a time these uncomfortable reflections, stole into the prisoner's room, in which she seldom failed to find her brother: there she lost all remembrance of the Baron; and, in conversing with friends so dear to her heart, progressively recovered that native cheerfulness which was one of the most engaging features of her character.--The sonnets, which her brother had so recently given her, not only served to raise her spirits, but had made an indelible impression on her mind. She smiled with something more than even her usual complacency on this love-taught poet. Of his tenderness and sincerity she could cherish no doubt. His honour and worth it was equally impossible to suspect. No one knew them better,--no one estimated them so highly as herself. To suppose he could be less amiable, less deserving of her attachment, would have appeared to her a crime of the most enormous magnitude. Thus did the fond effusions of love throw a veil over the eyes of their artless votary, in order to give a fair colouring, and to reconcile her to a conduct which, in another, her prudence would have taught her to condemn; but thus it is with too many erring mortals: when once they become the hood-winked slaves of any predominant passion, they are not only regardless of the world's opinion, but insensible to the secret admonitions of that silent monitor, which they carry in their bosom. Roseline as first acted merely from the generous impulse of pity and universal benevolence; but, in so doing, she admitted a guest to dispute with them a place in her breast, which neither time, reason, nor prudence, could banish thence. Our artless heroine was unfortunately the darling child of sensibility, and her mind so susceptible of the miseries and misfortunes of others, that, from the moment she discovered them, they became her own. What then must be the poignancy of her feelings, when she reflected on the dependent, helpless, and unprovided state of a lover, dearer to her than life!--who dared not disclose even his name,--whose blameless conduct proved to her partial judgement that he suffered unjustly, and whose virtues could alone reconcile her to herself for having risked so much on his account, and entrusted her heart to the keeping of one whose situation precluded hope,--who had declared he belonged to no one,--a prisoner, a stranger, without fortune or friends: yet, think as she would, these cruel circumstances, after the strictest investigation, acted as a talisman in favour of her lover.