As I turned on my pillow after retiring to the chamber alloted to me, I vainly sought repose. The journey of the day had been a long and weary one, although supported by the joyous anticipations of a buoyant spirit: tired I felt, but not sleepy, for a strange feeling of uncertainty and anxiety was now upon me, which was not relieved by the murmur of voices in the next apartment. My chamber, which was the same I had occupied in boyhood, was only separated from the next by a wooden partition, so common in country houses, and what was spoken there, even in a low voice, could be heard with a little attention by me. Shall I confess this attention was not wanting on my part? For the first time in my life I listened willingly to the communications of others not intended for my ear. My conscientious scruples were quieted by the reflection that long-existing ties bound me to the interests of the family, and besides, was I not about to unite myself to its dearest member, and had I not something like a brother’s right to learn what were the sorrows or troubles of Ernest, whose name was more than once spoken in the subdued but agitated voice of my venerated old friend, his father, whose chamber I knew adjoined mine. My name was also mentioned, and regret expressed by James that he had not confided in me and entered into an explanation. This certainly exonerated me from all blame in eaves-dropping, and I listened without dreading the admonitions of my inward monitor. “I will share your pillow to-night, my dear father,” said James, “for I fear you cannot sleep.” “As you please, my dear son,” he replied, “and surely we have cause for alarm. Oh! Ernest, Ernest, you whom I thought by intellectual culture and literary acquirements to place above the trials and troubles of this world, that after all you should act so rashly.” “Nay, my dear father, I trust nothing wrong has happened. My brother received a note just before his departure; but I do not know that it was from Bertha. It is true his love for her is most fervent, and another insult from Durell would arouse him almost to frenzy.” Here they spoke so low I could not connect the words, but “encounter—revenge—insult—Bertha—attack—ride—chastise”—and others as strange met my ear.