A girl, brought up in the fear of God and His commandments, can be so weak as to obey a man who ordered her to do a wicked thing. Could she be, afterwards, so cowardly as not to tell the man whom she had thus injured, even when she knew that he loved her? A wicked crime and a course of deceit! How could I frame the words so as to disarm that righteous wrath! "MY LORD,--It has been for a long time upon my conscience to tell you a thing which you ought to know before you waste one more thought upon the unworthy person to whom you addressed a confession. That confession, indeed, depicted your lordship with such fidelity as to make me the more ashamed to unburden my conscience. Know, then, that----" Here I stopped, with trembling fingers, which refused to move. "Know that"--what? That I was his wicked and unworthy wife, the creature whom most of all he must hate and despise. I could not tell him--not then. No; it must be told by word of mouth, with such extenuating phrases and softening of details as might present themselves to my troubled mind. I tore the letter into a thousand fragments. Was girl ever so bested? That sacred bond of union which brings happy lovers together, the crown of courtship, the end of wooing, the marriage service itself, was the thing which kept us asunder. I would tell him--later on. There would come an opportunity. I would make the opportunity, somewhere, at some time. Yes; the best way would be to wait till we were alone; and it should be in the evening, when my face and his would be partly veiled by the night; then I could whisper the story, and ask his forgiveness. But that opportunity never came, as will be presently seen. After morning prayers, that day, we walked upon the Terrace, where the company were, as usual, assembled, and all talking together below the trees. I held in my hand the manuscript of my lord's confession. Presently we saw him slowly advancing to meet us, wearing a grave and melancholy look. But then he was never one of those who think that the duties of life are to be met with a reckless laugh. "Even in laughter," said the Wise Man, "the heart is sorrowful: and the end of that mirth is heaviness." "Dear Miss Pleydell," whispered Peggy Baker, as he appeared, "can his lordship have repented already of what he said beneath the trees last night? The poor young gentleman wears a heavy countenance this morning." It was best to make no answer to this raillery. Let her say what she would; I cared nothing, and was too heavy myself to made reply. I would neither help nor hinder. Then, leaving Mrs. Esther with the party, I advanced boldly and met my lord, returning him his manuscripts before the eyes of all. Everybody stared, wondering what could be in the packet I placed in his hands; he, however, received it with a low bow, and accompanied me to my party, saying nothing for the moment.