t kindness. But these fluctuations shook to its
depths the soul of the sensitive youth; he no longer deemed the world
subject to him, because he possessed Evadne's love; he felt in every nerve
that the dire storms of the mental universe were about to attack his
fragile being, which quivered at the expectation of its advent.

Perdita, who then resided with Evadne, saw the torture that Adrian endured.
She loved him as a kind elder brother; a relation to guide, protect, and
instruct her, without the too frequent tyranny of parental authority. She
adored his virtues, and with mixed contempt and indignation she saw Evadne
pile drear sorrow on his head, for the sake of one who hardly marked her.
In his solitary despair Adrian would often seek my sister, and in covered
terms express his misery, while fortitude and agony divided the throne of
his mind. Soon, alas! was one to conquer. Anger made no part of his
emotion. With whom should he be angry? Not with Raymond, who was
unconscious of the misery he occasioned; not with Evadne, for her his soul
wept tears of blood--poor, mistaken girl, slave not tyrant was she, and
amidst his own anguish he grieved for her future destiny. Once a writing of
his fell into Perdita's hands; it was blotted with tears--well might any
blot it with the like--

"Life"--it began thus--"is not the thing romance writers describe it;
going through the measures of a dance, and after various evolutions
arriving at a conclusion, when the dancers may sit down and repose. While
there is life there is action and change. We go on, each thought linked to
the one which was its parent, each act to a previous act. No joy or sorrow
dies barren of progeny, which for ever generated and generating, weaves the
chain that make our life:

Un dia llama a otro dia
y ass i llama, y encadena
llanto a llanto, y pena a pena.

Truly disappointment is the guardian deity of human life; she sits
at the threshold of unborn time, and marshals the events as they
come forth. Once my heart sat lightly in my bosom; all the beauty of the
world was doubly beautiful, irradiated by the sun-light shed from my own
soul. O wherefore are love and ruin for ever joined in this our mortal
dream? So that when we make our hearts a lair for that gently seeming
beast, its companion enters with it, and pitilessly lays waste what might
have been an home and a shelter."

By degrees his health was shaken by his misery, and then his intellect
yie