me, dear Oswald, none but English wives will do for England. It is not for me to advise, and I scarce need say that I shall never allude _there_ to what I have seen _here_; but Corinne, all-charming as she is, makes me think, with Walpole, 'Of what use would she be in a house? Now the house is everything with us, you know, at least to our wives. Can you fancy your lovely Italian remaining quietly at home, while fox-hunts or debates took you abroad? or leaving you at your wine, to make tea against your rising from table? Dear Oswald, the domestic worth of our women you will never find elsewhere. Here men have nothing to do but to please the ladies; therefore, the more agreeable they find them, the better; but with us, where men lead active lives, the women should bloom in the shade; to which it were a thousand pities if Corinne were condemned. I would place her on the English throne, not beneath my humble roof. My Lord! I knew your mother, whom your respected father so much regretted; just such a woman will be my young cousin; and that is the wife I would choose, were I still of an age to be beloved. Farewell, my dear Nevil; do not take what I have said amiss, for no one can admire Corinne more than I do; nay, perhaps, at your years, I should not be able to give up the hope of winning her." He pressed his young friend's hand very cordially, and left him, ere Oswald could utter a word; but Edgarmond understood the cause of this silence, and, content with the grasp which replied to his, was glad to conclude a conversation which had cost him no slight pain. The only portion of what he had said that reached the heart of Oswald, was the mention of his mother, and the deep affection his father felt for her. She had died ere their child was fourteen; yet he reveringly recalled the retiring virtues of her character. "Madman that I am!" he cried, "I desired to know what kind of wife my father had destined me, and I am answered by the image of his own, whom he adored. What would I more, then? why deceive myself? why pretend an ignorance of what he would think now, could I yet consult him?" Still, it was with terror that he thought of returning to Corinne, without giving her a confirmation of the sentiments he had testified. The tumult of his breast became at last so uncontrollable, that it occasioned a recurrence of the distressing accident against which he now believed his lungs secure. One may imagine the frightful scene--his alarmed domestics calling for help, as he lay silently hoping that death would end his sorrow. "If I could die, once more looking on Corinne," he thought, "once more called her Romeo." A few tears fell from his eyes, the first that any grief, save the loss of his father, had cost him since that event. He wrote a melancholy line accounting for his absence, to Corinne. She had began the day with fond delusive hopes. Believing herself loved, she was content; for she knew not very clearly what more on earth she wished.