"O that Alvaro was here, that I might hear the sound of his voice,—that he might hear mine for the last time, before I pass to the world of shadows. He will be lonely in the world without me. Alvaro is the last of his race,—the last of a long line of illustrious hidalgos. Holy Lady of Majorga,—sweet _San Juan de Dios_, intercede for me! Dearest Ronald, kiss me—kiss me for the last time, while I have yet feeling, for death is chilling my whole frame." In an agony of love and sorrow, he passionately pressed his lips to those of the dying girl. She never spoke again. It almost seemed as if he had intercepted her last breath, for at the moment their lips met, a slight tremour passed over her whole form, and the pure spirit of the beautiful donna had fled for ever. *CHAPTER X.* *EL CONVENTO DE SANTA CRUZ.* "The abbess was of noble blood, But early took the veil and hood; Ere upon life she cast a look, Or knew the world that she forsook." _Marmion_, canto ii. Grey daylight was straggling through the mullioned windows of the nunnery of Santa Cruz de Jarciejo, which stood close on the skirts of the wood, when the portress was aroused from her straw pallet by a loud peal at the bell, which hung in the porch. On withdrawing the wooden cover of the vizzy hole in the outer door, she crossed herself, and turned up her eyes; and instead of attending to those without, ran to tell the lady abbess that a British officer on horseback, bearing in his arms a dead woman, had been led thither by the old padre Ignacio el Pastor, who was demanding admittance. The abbess, who in the convent was known as _El Madre Santa Martha_, had many scruples about opening the gates to them; but another tremendous peal at the bell, seconded by a blow which Ronald dealt with the basket-hilt of his sword on the iron-studded door, put an end to the matter, and she desired the portress to usher them into the _parlatorio_. Entering the gateway in the massive wall surrounding the gardens of the convent, they were led through the formal lines of flower-beds and shrubbery to the main building, where a carved gothic door in a low round archway, on the key-stone of which appeared a mouldered cross, gave them admittance to the chamber called the _parlatorio_, where the sisters were allowed to receive the visits of their friends at the iron gratings in a stone-screen which crossed the room, completely separating it from the rest of the convent. These grates were strong bars of iron, crossed and recrossed with wire, so as to preclude all possibility of touching the inmates, who now crowded close to them, all gazing with amazement and vague apprehension at the corpse of the young lady, which the officer deposited gently on a wooden bench, and seated himself beside it in apathetic sorrow, unmindful of the many pitying eyes that were fixed upon him. Meanwhile the lady abbess, a handsome woman about twenty,