beside Bertha, who laid her head on his breast,
and wept bitterly. His most soothing words were unable to calm her
grief. "Bertha," he said, "you were always so stout-hearted; how can
you thus give up all hope of a happier destiny?"

"Hope?" she replied, sorrowfully: "to our hope, to our happiness, there
is an eternal end."

"But hearken, dearest," replied Albert, who, to cheer up her drooping
spirit, endeavoured to inspire her with courage; "let not this slight
interruption to our hopes throw its chilling influence over the purity
of our love, as if it were to extinguish altogether its bright flame.
All will be well yet. Rather let us put our trust in God, and wait his
almighty will; for I never can believe that He who knows the secret of
our hearts, and has joined them together by the indissoluble tie of
faithful attachment, will not, in his own way, make all things to work
for our good." These consoling words produced a smile upon her
countenance; but it pourtrayed the character of despondency rather than
of hope.

She replied, after a short silence, "Listen to me with attention,
Albert. I must acquaint you with a profound secret, upon which hangs my
father's life. He is as bitter an enemy to the League, as he is the
firm friend of the Duke. He is not come here solely for the purpose of
fetching his daughter home; no, he is using his utmost endeavour to
find out the plans of the enemy, and with money and address to spread
distrust and confusion among them. Do you suppose, then, that such a
determined adversary to the League, would ever consent to give his
daughter to a man who seeks to raise himself by our destruction? to one
who has attached himself to a party, whose object is not justice, but
plunder?"

"Your zeal, Bertha, for the Duke's cause, carries you too far," the
young man interrupted her; "you ought to know that many an honourable
man serves in our army."

"And even if this were the case," she replied, with animation, "still
they are deceived and led away, as you yourself also are."

"How are you so certain of that?" answered Albert, who, though he
suspected she was somewhat right, blushed to find the party he had
espoused should be so vilified by his beloved: "might not your father
be also equally blinded and deceived? How can he serve with such zeal
the cause of that proud ambitious Duke, who murders his nobility,
treads his citizens in the dust, squanders the industry of the land in
riotous livin