To the fallen and degraded, whom distress, misfortune, friendlessness may have driven to a life from which their conscience and their feelings often revolt, how wilfully, how wantonly criminal must the pampered minion of luxury appear, who errs in the midst of plenty, pleasure, honour! Alas! it is that very profusion which gives leisure for the heart and the imagination to go astray. The lowly know not the dangers to which the great are exposed. Still less can the great estimate the temptations to which the poor and friendless are liable. Let each be lenient to their erring sisters! Nor let those who, united to the object of their choice, are happy in the interchange of mutual affection, exult too proudly in their irreproachable character and untarnished reputation. Rather let them thankfully and humbly acknowledge the mercy that has cast their lot where their inclination and their duty coincide; which has spared them the misery of warm feelings sent back upon the ardent heart which gave them birth, and the temptation of meeting with kindness, where it would be sinful to indulge the emotions such kindness is calculated to excite. Why should I trace the progress of events unfortunately of too common occurrence? Walter was the first whose eyes were opened to the nature of his own feelings; but Lady Ellersville, whose heart, under her guarded exterior, was teeming with all the affections which are doomed to form the joy and respectability, or the misery and degradation of woman, at length made the fatal confession to herself. She would have avoided him, and sought safety in flight; but Walter was too little in the habit of self-denial quietly to relinquish the society he found necessary to his happiness. Had Mrs. Fitz-Eustace been aware what were the dangers to which her son’s morals and his welfare were exposed, how little would she have rejoiced in his accession to the earldom of Sotheron, an event which occurred about this period, and which promised to afford scope for those talents which were his mother’s pride. She had scarcely allowed her heart to dilate with the pleasurable emotions from which even her chastened spirit could not defend itself, when she was doomed to a new and unlooked-for sorrow. The assumed coldness of Lady Ellersville only excited and increased the ardour of Walter’s passion; for he loved her with the uncontrolled vehemence which characterised all his feelings. The sequel may easily be guessed. The moment came when the confession locked in the secret bosom of each, was made to the other. Lord Ellersville at length became jealous and umbrageous. Her proud spirit could not endure to quail under the glance of a man she despised. To avoid suspicion she plunged into actual guilt.