inues to correspond with him. He makes no further use of her
condescension than to boast of her favors, until at the command of his
patron, Don Ferdinand, he induces Idalia to make an assignation with
him. Ferdinand meets her and not without difficulty at length effects
her ruin. Her lover's friend, Henriquez, in conducting her to a place of
safety in Padua, becomes himself the victim of her charms, quarrels with
Ferdinand, and slays him and is slain. Henriquez' brother, Myrtano, next
succeeds as Idalia's adorer, but learning that he is about to make an
advantageous marriage, she secretly decamps. In her flight the very
guide turns out to be a noble lover in disguise. When she escapes from
him in a ship bound for Naples, the sea-captain pays her crude court,
but just in time to save her from his embraces the ship is captured by
Barbary corsairs--commanded by a young married couple. Though the
heroine is in peasant dress, she is treated with distinction by her
captors. Her history moves them to tears, and they in turn are in the
midst of relating to her the involved story of their courtship, when the
vessel is wrecked by a gale. Borne ashore on a plank, Idalia is succored
by cottagers, and continues her journey in man's clothes. She is loved
by a lady, and by the lady's husband, who turns out to be her dear
Myrtano. Their felicity is interrupted by the jealousy of Myrtano's
wife, who appeals to the Pope and forces the lovers to separate by his
order. Idalia leads a miserable life, persecuted by all the young
gallants of Rome. One day she sees Florez, the first cause of all her
misfortunes, pass the window, and with thoughts bent on revenge sends
him a billet, which he carries to his master. Myrtano keeps the
appointment, muffled in a cloak, and Idalia stabs him by mistake.
Overcome by remorse, she dies by the same knife.

The motivation of the heroine at the beginning of the story, as Miss
Morgan has pointed out,[13]is more elaborate than usual in Haywoodian
romance. To show a young girl's vanity teasing her into an intrigue
required a more delicate appreciation of the passions than the stock
situations in love stories afforded. Obliged to draw upon her own
resources, Mrs. Haywood handled the incidents with a niceness that could
hardly have been expected from the author of "Love in Excess." Her sense
for _vraisemblance_ protected her from many absurdities, though not from
all. For instance, when Idalia to preserve herself