the most
imperious, haughty, tameless spirit, with which ever mortal was gifted.
I quailed before my father only; and he, generous and noble, but
capricious and tyrannical, at once fostered and checked the wild
impetuosity of my character, making obedience necessary, but inspiring
no respect for the motives which guided his commands. To be a man, free,
independent; or, in better words, insolent and domineering, was the hope
and prayer of my rebel heart.

My father had one friend, a wealthy Genoese noble, who, in a political
tumult, was suddenly sentenced to banishment, and his property
confiscated. The Marchese Torella went into exile alone. Like my father,
he was a widower: he had one child, the almost infant Juliet, who was
left under my father's guardianship. I should certainly have been an
unkind master to the lovely girl, but that I was forced by my position
to become her protector. A variety of childish incidents all tended to
one point,--to make Juliet see in me a rock of refuge; I in her, one,
who must perish through the soft sensibility of her nature too rudely
visited, but for my guardian care. We grew up together. The opening rose
in May was not more sweet than this dear girl. An irradiation of beauty
was spread over her face. Her form, her step, her voice--my heart weeps
even now, to think of all of relying, gentle, loving, and pure, that was
enshrined in that celestial tenement. When I was eleven and Juliet eight
years of age, a cousin of mine, much older than either--he seemed to us
a man--took great notice of my playmate; he called her his bride, and
asked her to marry him. She refused, and he insisted, drawing her
unwillingly towards him. With the countenance and emotions of a maniac I
threw myself on him--I strove to draw his sword--I clung to his neck
with the ferocious resolve to strangle him: he was obliged to call for
assistance to disengage himself from me. On that night I led Juliet to
the chapel of our house: I made her touch the sacred relics--I harrowed
her child's heart, and profaned her child's lips with an oath, that she
would be mine, and mine only.

Well, those days passed away. Torella returned in a few years, and
became wealthier and more prosperous than ever. When I was seventeen, my
father died; he had been magnificent to prodigality; Torella rejoiced
that my minority would afford an opportunity for repairing my fortunes.
Juliet and I had been affianced beside my father's deathbed--To