his wounds were scarcely closed, and the emotions that he experienced reacted most powerfully upon his health. Sir, man is born for suffering, and not for joy. His body can support an immense weight of sorrow and pain without giving way; but it is worn out by pleasure, and joy kills it. Giovanni, uneasy about his friend, strictly forbade his leaving his room, and that evening the family went alone to their walk. Albert returned sadly to the saloon, become more desert for him than the sands of Sahara, in company with Giovanni, who, in the hope of distracting his loneliness, talked to him of battles and of victories; although had he known how far the mind of his friend was from all such subjects, he might have given himself far less trouble with an equally good result. Little caring then for glory, Albert's heart was with Flaminia under the perfumed shade of the vines and jasmines. At their return, Flaminia held out to Albert a spray of jasmine covered with flowers, saying to him: 'You like these flowers, so I bring you them.' When Albert had retired to his own room, he took this bouquet and covered it with kisses: he listened with delight to the voice that issued from those flowers and that told him such sweet words. A flame seemed to mingle with their perfumes that carried a new life to his heart; but it carried there also the light. Another voice made itself heard and showed him the truth, and he fell from the regions of happiness where his dream had carried him, into the implacable reality; for he then discovered with what sort of an affection they were both animated. And he a knight of the Order of Malta! If absence could have given the repose of forgetfulness to Flaminia, Albert would not have hesitated to have left her at once. But if there exist attachments so slight that the simple absence of their object is sufficient to cure them, so there are others which may be likened to those long-lived plants that extend their roots in all directions and all depths; so that one cannot tear them from the soil in which they have once gained a hold. Such affections as these resist all human efforts, and absence but serves to render their wounds more poignant and more lively. Albert understood too well the character of Flaminia not to know that their destiny was irrevocably fixed. Divine Providence seemed to have drawn them together in this world but to make them merit, by a sacrifice of their affections, the happiness that was destined for them in the next. The ordinary remedy of absence would have been useless in their case. Albert understood this, and the idea of getting himself absolved from his vows of knighthood came to him. This thought he repelled. It was not that he believed the success of such a measure impossible, but that he saw in it a desertion of his duty; he felt that his conscience would not be in tranquillity, and that it would perpetually remind him that one cannot thus break his engagements with God. He knelt down