to my suit; but this day--I know not how it
is--I feel a more sustained and settled courage to address thee, and
learn the happiest or the worst. I have rivals, I know,--rivals who are
more powerful than the poor artist. Are they also more favored?"

Isabel blushed faintly, but her countenance was grave and distressed.
Looking down, and marking some hieroglyphical figures in the dust with
the point of her slipper, she said, with some hesitation and a vain
attempt to be gay, "Signor, whoever wastes his thoughts on an actress
must submit to have rivals. It is our unhappy destiny not to be sacred
even to ourselves."

"But you have told me, Isabel, that you do not love this destiny,
glittering though it seem,--that your heart is not in the vocation which
your talents adorn."

"Ah, no!" said the actress, her eyes filling with tears, "it is a
miserable lot to be slave to a multitude."

"Fly then with me," said the artist, passionately. "Quit forever the
calling that divides that heart I would have all my own. Share my fate
now and forever,--my pride, my delight, my ideal! Thou shalt inspire my
canvas and my song, thy beauty shall be made at once holy and renowned.
In the galleries of princes crowds shall gather round the effigy of
a Venus or a saint, and a whisper shall break forth, 'It is Isabel di
Pisani!' Ah! Isabel, I adore thee: tell me that I do not worship in
vain."

"Thou art good and fair," said Isabel, gazing on her lover as he pressed
his cheek nearer to hers, and clasped her hand in his. "But what should
I give thee in return?"

"Love, love; only love!"

"A sister's love?"

"Ah, speak not with such cruel coldness!"

"It is all I have for thee. Listen to me, signor. When I look on your
face, when I hear your voice, a certain serene and tranquil calm creeps
over and lulls thoughts, oh, how feverish, how wild! When thou art gone,
the day seems a shade more dark; but the shadow soon flies. I miss thee
not, I think not of thee,--no, I love thee not; and I will give myself
only where I love."

"But I would teach thee to love me,--fear it not. Nay, such love as thou
now describest in our tranquil climates is the love of innocence and
youth."

"And it is the innocence he would destroy," said Isabel, rather to
herself than to him.

Glyndon drew back, conscience-stricken.

"No, it may not be!" she said, rising, and extricating her hand gently
from his grasp. "Leave me, and forget me. You do not understand,