Matilda’s breast meanwhile swelled with sensations of unutterable delight: her soul, borne on the pinions of anticipated happiness, flashed in triumphant glances from her fiery eyes. She could scarcely forbear clasping Verezzi in her arms, and claiming him as her own; but prudence, and a fear of in what manner a premature declaration of love might be received, prevented her. They arrived at the castella, and a surgeon from the neighbouring convent was sent for by Verezzi. The surgeon soon arrived, examined Matilda’s arm, and declared that no unpleasant consequences could ensue. Retired to her own apartment, those transports, which before had been allayed by Verezzi’s presence, now unrestrained by reason, involved Matilda’s senses in an ecstasy of pleasure. She threw herself on the bed, and, in all the exaggerated colours of imagination, portrayed the transports which Zastrozzi’s artifice had opened to her view. Visions of unreal bliss floated during the whole night in her disordered fancy; her senses where whirled around in alternate ecstasies of happiness and despair, as almost palpable dreams pressed upon her disturbed brain. At one time she imagined that Verezzi, consenting to their union, presented her his hand: that at her touch the flesh crumbled from it, and, a shrieking spectre, he fled from her view: again, silvery clouds floated across her sight, and unconnected, disturbed visions occupied her imagination till the morning. Verezzi’s manner, as he met Matilda the following morning, was unusually soft and tender; and in a voice of solicitude, he inquired concerning her health. The roseate flush of animation which tinged her cheek, the triumphant glance of animation which danced in her scintillating eye, seemed to render the inquiry unnecessary. A dewy moisture filled her eyes, as she gazed with an expression of tumultuous, yet repressed rapture upon the hapless Verezzi. Still did she purpose, in order to make her triumph more certain, to protract the hour of victory; and, leaving her victim, wandered into the forest to seek Zastrozzi. When she arrived at the cottage, she learnt that he had walked forth.--She soon met him. “Oh! Zastrozzi--my best Zastrozzi!” exclaimed Matilda, “what a source of delight have you opened to me! Verezzi is mine--oh! transporting thought! will be mine for ever. That distant manner which he usually affected towards me, is changed to a sweet, an ecstatic expression of tenderness. Oh! Zastrozzi, receive my best, my most fervent thanks.” “Julia need not die then,” muttered Zastrozzi; “when once you possess Verezzi, her destruction is of little consequence.” The most horrible scheme of revenge at this instant glanced across Zastrozzi’s mind.