“This is hard, this is cruel; but you shall have an approving conscience, my own Ellen; and if your conscience will be easier when I am gone, I will not linger: I will order every thing for my journey, and I will go at dusk to-night. Till then, you will let me be with you; till then, I may look on your face—I may listen to your voice—I may breathe the same air with you!” He flew to order his departure, and in another instant was by her side. There was a melancholy satisfaction in being together, and yet, when they were so, they could not speak: what could they say that was not fraught with wretchedness? “I must see our children, Ellen.” He had been in the habit of calling all the children “our;” but the little word, which from the force of habit escaped him, struck daggers to the hearts of both. The two elder were his children who might soon be at home to claim them. They all three came, and poor Hamilton devoured them with kisses. The little Agnes was just old enough to know him, and to hold out her arms to him with a smile of joy. They could neither of them endure this long; they could not talk to the children—they could not play with them—they could not listen to their prattle, and they were soon sent away. Strange to say, these last few hours, whose flight they so much dreaded, hung heavy. They wished to arrest the course of time, and yet they knew not how to pass it. They strolled into the garden: every thing there spoke of hope and promise; every thing within their own bosoms boded unheard-of wretchedness. They had several times paced in silence round the sheltered parterre, when Ellen turned deadly pale, and stopped for a few moments. “You must lean on me, Ellen! You must take my arm.” Her feebleness compelled her to do so, and once more he had the happiness of feeling that lovely form rest on him for support. Neither spoke again. Both hearts were too full for utterance. In silence they bent their course homeward. They again returned to the drawing-room. They once more sat down there together. They could not bring themselves to quit each other for a moment,—to lose one instant of these few precious hours; and yet to each, the presence of the other was oppressive. This state of misery and _gêne_ was worse than that occasioned by the presence of others. They could not, at such a moment, speak on indifferent subjects; and if they alluded to their own situation, it must lead to passionate bursts of feeling, which she considered as criminal, and which he also dreaded for her sake. At length the hour of departure came. The carriage was announced—and he went up-stairs alone once more to give his parting blessing to the children. He returned to her. “I think we may correspond,” she said, “there can be nothing wrong in that, till our fate is quite decided.”