She looked at him so long without speaking that he began to fear she did not know him after all. He raised the little hand to his lips, and then stroked it caressingly; the action, the touch, seemed to strike some chord long sleeping. “Clide, Clide!” she murmured, and the tears rose and rolled in large drops down her cheeks. His heart was wrung with pity; there was no room for any other feeling. If she had wronged him as deeply as he had ever feared, he forgave it all. He remembered nothing but that they had once loved each other, that she had suffered cruelly, and that she was dying. “My poor Isabel! I forgive you with all my heart, as I hope to be forgiven; so help me God!” He let his head fall on the pillow beside her and wept silently. Admiral de Winton made a sign to the attendant that they had better withdraw and leave them alone; she hesitated a moment, and then followed him and closed the door softly behind her. And so they were once more together—those two who had been joined and parted, and reunited now for a moment only before the final parting. No one disturbed them, no eye looked behind the curtain while that last sacred interview lasted. For three hours Clide knelt by the side of his dying wife, her hand in his, her head resting on his breast. He whispered words of tenderness and mercy to the wearied spirit; he told her of a Love greater than his, and of a pardon mightier and more availing, of which his was but the pledge and the forerunner. At sunset she died. TO BE CONCLUDED NEXT MONTH. NAPOLEON I. AND PIUS VII.[75] In the _Life of Pope Pius VII._ Miss Allies has given us a picture of rare beauty and deep interest. We think, however, that the title of the book has not been well chosen. It is not a biography of Pius VII., but a history of the efforts of Napoleon Bonaparte to make the Papacy an appendage and support of the vast empire which he had founded with his sword. The materials for the narrative have been drawn chiefly from the _Mémoires_ of Cardinal Consalvi and the _Memorie Storiche_ of Cardinal Pacca, both of whom were witnesses of the facts which they relate. The author is also greatly indebted to the recent work of d’Haussonville, _L’Eglise Romaine et le Premier Empire_.