"I will be guarded; not a word of love shall pass my lips. I will only gaze on her sweet face, and listen to the kind tones of her dear voice again, before we part for ever," he thought, and darting forwards, was speedily walking by her side. He believed himself firm in his purpose, strong, unwavering in his resolution; but his heart had been wrung to its inmost core, his spirit bent beneath its deep, wild agony, and at that moment temptation was too powerful; he could not, oh, he could not part from her, leave her to believe as others did. Could he bear that she, for whose smile he would have toiled day and night, to be regarded with esteem, to obtain but one glance of approbation, could he bear that she should think of him as the unworthy being he was represented? No! he felt he could not, and in one moment of unrestrained and passionate feeling, his love was told, the treasured secret of his breaking heart revealed. Emmeline heard, and every limb of her slight frame trembled, almost convulsively, with her powerful struggle for composure, with the wish still to conceal from him the truth that he was to her even as she to him, dear even as life itself; but the struggle was vain. The anguish which the sight of his deep wretchedness inflicted on that young and gentle bosom, which from childhood had ever bled for others' woes, was too powerful, and led on by an irresistible impulse, she acknowledged his affections were returned; for she felt did she not speak it, the extreme agitation she could not hide would at once betray the truth, but at the same instant she avowed her unhappy love, she told him they must part and for ever. She conjured him for her sake to adhere to his resolution, and leave the neighbourhood of Oakwood; she thanked him with all the deep enthusiasm of her nature, for that regard for her peace which she felt confident had from the first dictated his resigning his curacy, and braving the cruel prejudices of all around him, even those of her own father, rather than betray his secret and her own; rather than linger near her, to play upon her feelings, and tempt her, in the intensity of her affection for him, to forget the duty, the gratitude, the love, she owed her parents.