—“My dear lady,” said she smiling, “had you not rather obtain a personal knowledge of those ladies, who are treated of in these moth-eaten ill-written leaves, and whose adventures, or at least as much of them as deserves your attention, I can myself relate to you concisely?—Look!” she continued, at the same time removing a silken curtain which extended itself over the whole western side of her closet; “look! here are the portraits of the most remarkable among those celebrated ladies, respecting whose lives some idle person has contrived to make you so inquisitive. I confess, I _do_ possess the writings in question; but believe me, daughter, they are buried under such a heap of uninteresting papers relating to different matters, that to explore them would be too tedious a task for the leisure of an anchoret or the patience of a saint.” I stood silent, and listened, and looked; but in truth the speaking portraits of these females, the most lovely and excellent of their day, and the interesting fragments of their annals which escaped from the Abbess of Zurich as she pointed them out to me by name, were by no means likely to cure me of my inclination to know more of their adventures. You are not the only one of the family, Oswald, who possesses the talent of persuasion; your sister too inherits some little portion of that for which her brother is so remarkable. I conquered; and before evening arrived, I had the satisfaction to see brought into my chamber a large iron chest, which contained materials of sufficient interest to steal me from my own sorrows, and transport me into a different world from that in which I am existing—oh! how delightful is it for a wounded heart thus to steal itself away from the theatre of its afflictions! _Elizabeth to Oswald._ The morning broke, and found me still occupied in examining the moth-eaten parchments; selecting those which appeared to be the most interesting, and separating them from the rest, which I purposed to reserve for a future opportunity. It was fortunate, that I did not delay this examination till the next day. Scarcely were the nuns returned from matins, when my treasure was redemanded of me. _The_ Abbess came to make excuses in person. She talked of secrets regarding the Convent, and the commands of the Bishop of Coira, though, as far as I can make out, the _great lady_ (for such is the appellation which the nuns give the Domina of Zurich) is totally independent of him. She might as well have spared her apologies; I was angry, and scarcely could prevail on myself to answer her with common politeness. She had broken her word with me; and therefore I feel but little compunction for having over-reached her, and kept back several of the writings, which I had previously laid aside. They happen to be exactly those (at least I hope so) which the sight of those portraits in the Domina’s closet had made me most anxious to examine.