“I sought to learn no more of poor Fanny’s history, Emily; I scarcely heard the tale of her subsequent desertion and destitution. My conscience was awakened, and fearfully did she knell in my ears my own condemnation. ‘Who made ye to differ?’ asked my heart, as I gazed on this victim to vanity and treachery. Who taught this fallen creature to value the allurements of dress beyond the adornment of innocence? Who sowed in her bosom the seeds of envy and discontent, and nurtured them there until they bore the poisoned fruit of sin? Was I guiltless of my brother’s blood? Had not I been the _first_ tempter of the guileless child? Here, then, was an evidence of my influence;—how fatally exercised! “Emily, I have repented in tears and agony of spirit:—I have prayed that this weight of blood-guiltiness might be removed from my soul; and I humbly trust my prayer has not been in vain:—but even now my heart sickens at the recollection of the being whom my example first led astray. It was at the bedside of the dying girl,—when my spirit was bowed in humble penitence—that the words of religious truth first impressed themselves upon my adamantine heart. I had listened unmoved to the promises and denunciations of the gospel, when uttered from the pulpit; but now, the time, the place, the circumstance gave them tenfold power. I visited Fanny Rivers daily, until death released the penitent from her sufferings, and then, I fell into a deep melancholy from which nothing could arouse me, and for which no one could account. “Frank Harcourt was annoyed and vexed at this change. He earnestly pressed our immediate marriage, and talked about a trip to Paris as an infallible cure for my ‘_nervous excitement_.’ But in proportion as my better feelings were awakened, my attachment to him decreased, until I actually shrunk from a union with him. He now appeared to me frivolous in his tastes, and the light tone with which he spoke of moral duties, though often listened to as an idle jest, in calmer times, now offended and disgusted me. In vain I tried to recall my past feelings. In vain I gazed upon his exquisite face and watched the movements of his graceful form, in the hope of again experiencing the thrill of pleasure which had once been awakened by his presence. The flame had been kindled at the unholy shrine of vanity, and already the ashes of perished fancies had gathered over it to dim its brightness. I could no longer cheat myself into the belief that I loved Frank Harcourt. He was still as glorious in beauty,—still the idol of society; but the spell was broken, and I looked back with wonder to my past delusion.