_Miss Gryll._ And these inexplicable affinities Lord Curryfin has found in you, and you in him. _Miss Niphet._. He has never told me so. _Miss Gryll._ Not in words: but looks and actions have spoken for him. You have both struggled to conceal your feelings from others, perhaps even from yourselves. But you are both too ingenuous to dissemble successfully. You suit each other thoroughly: and I have no doubt you will find in each other the happiness I most cordially wish you. Miss Gryll soon found an opportunity of conversing with Lord Curryfin, and began with him somewhat sportively: 'I have been thinking,' she said, 'of an old song which contains a morsel of good advice-- Be sure to be off with the old love, Before you are on with the new. You begin by making passionate love to me, and all at once you turn round to one of my young friends, and say, "Zephyrs whisper how I love you."' _Lord Curryfin._ Oh no! no, indeed. I have not said that, nor anything to the same effect. _Miss Gryll._ Well, if you have not exactly said it, you have implied it. You have looked it. You have felt it. You cannot conceal it. You cannot deny it. I give you notice that, if I die for love of you, I shall haunt you. _Lord Curryfin._ Ah! Miss Gryll, if you do not die till you die for love of me, you will be as immortal as Circe, whom you so divinely represented. _Miss Gryll._ You offered yourself to me, to have and to hold, for ever and aye. Suppose I claim you. Do not look so frightened. You deserve some punishment, but that would be too severe. But, to a certain extent, you belong to me, and I claim the right to transfer you. I shall make a present of you to _Miss Niphet._. So, according to the old rules of chivalry, I order you, as my captive by right, to present yourself before her, and tell her that you have come to receive her commands, and obey them to the letter. I expect she will keep you in chains for life. You do not look much alarmed at the prospect. Yet you must be aware that you are a great criminal; and you have not a word to say in your own justification. _Lord Curryfin._ Who could be insensible to charms like yours, if hope could have mingled with the contemplation? But there were several causes by which hope seemed forbidden, and therefore---- _Miss Gryll._ And therefore when beauty, and hope, and sympathy shone under a more propitious star, you followed its guidance. You could not help yourself: What heart were his that could resist That melancholy smile? I shall flatter myself that I might have kept you if I had tried hard for it at first; but Il pentirsi da sesto nulla giova. No doubt you might have said with the old song, I ne'er could any lustre see In eyes that would not look on me. But you scarcely gave me time to look on you before you were gone. You see, however, like our own Mirror of Knighthood, I make the best of my evil fate, and