I went upstairs as soon as it was over, and found Esther still asleep. It was a wet, miserable evening. The rain was dripping slowly and heavily from the roof to the window-sill, and from the window-sill to the piazza below. A thick, suffocating fog, possessed the earth, through which the distant lights blinked drearily; even the noises of the streets sounded muffled and subdued. It was so warm, that the low soft-coal fire in the grate seemed oppressive; yet, when I opened the window, there was a damp, choking heaviness in the air that was worse, even, than the dry heat of the room. It seemed as if the spirit of the fog was sitting a night-mare on my breast, and pressing down with a hand like lead the beating of my heart, and stopping my very breath. There was no shaking off the weight, nor driving away the gloomy fancies that the hour bred. It was in vain that I lit the gas, and closed the blinds, and laying my ball-dress on the bed, tried to interest myself in my preparations for the evening. Between me and all pleasant anticipation, there hung a black pall of presentiment, and no effort of my will could put it aside. The very struggle to free myself from it, seemed to make the gloom close thicker around me. The house was so still; the servants were all downstairs; the ticking of the clock on the nursery mantelpiece was all the sound that broke the stillness, and that, so regular, so monotonous, was worse than silence. It was a time "For thought to do her part," for conscience and reason to be heard. Should I go into the world and try to forget it? Should I leave the little helpless child asleep there, in charge of a woman I distrusted and disliked, and go where music and pleasure would drown the dread for her that was gnawing at my heart? What, that was good for hours of trial, had I learned in my short experience of pleasure? What, that I could remember with satisfaction, had occurred in the two nights of gaiety that I had just passed through? What, in the flatteries of Victor Viennet, in the admiring eyes of strangers, in the envy of my cousin, that I could dare to remember in church--on Sunday--under a quiet evening sky--or on a fresh, pure early summer morning? Alas! it was out of tune with all of these; there was utterly a fault about it--it turned to ashes as I grasped it. It was not true pleasure. It was not a worthy pursuit. As far as I had followed it already, it had led me into sin, into pride, insincerity and anger. It had done me no good. I felt that. Had I the courage to put it away from me now? Could I say, without an effort, I will keep myself out of the way of seeing Victor Viennet again? I will never remember but to condemn the hours that I have spent with him? Could I return to the dull routine I had formerly marked out for myself, without an effort that would cost me many tears? But if I could not do this, what was my religion worth? If this self-denial was so hard, did it not prove that the world had got