are now independent of Lucille; wherever
you go, a thousand hereafter can supply my place. Farewell!"

She rose, as she said this, to leave the room; but St. Amand seizing her
hand, which she in vain endeavoured to withdraw from his clasp, poured
forth incoherently, passionately, his reproaches on himself, his
eloquent persuasion against her resolution.

"I confess," said he, "that I have been allured for a moment; I confess
that Julie's beauty made me less sensible to your stronger, your holier,
oh! far, far holier title to my love! But forgive me, dearest Lucille;
already I return to you, to all I once felt for you; make me not curse
the blessing of sight that I owe to you. You must not leave me; never
can we two part. Try me, only try me, and if ever hereafter my heart
wander from you, _then_, Lucille, leave me to my remorse!"

Even at that moment Lucille did not yield; she felt that his prayer was
but the enthusiasm of the hour; she felt that there was a virtue in her
pride,--that to leave him was a duty to herself. In vain he pleaded; in
vain were his embraces, his prayers; in vain he reminded her of their
plighted troth, of her aged parents, whose happiness had become wrapped
in her union with him: "How,--even were it as you wrongly believe,--how,
in honour to them, can I desert you, can I wed another?"

"Trust that, trust all, to me," answered Lucille; "your honour shall
be my care, none shall blame _you_; only do not let your marriage with
Julie be celebrated here before their eyes: that is all I ask, all they
can expect. God bless you! do not fancy I shall be unhappy, for whatever
happiness the world gives you, shall I not have contributed to bestow
it? and with that thought I am above compassion."

She glided from his arms, and left him to a solitude more bitter even
than that of blindness. That very night Lucille sought her mother; to
her she confided all. I pass over the reasons she urged, the arguments
she overcame; she conquered rather than convinced, and leaving to Madame
le Tisseur the painful task of breaking to her father her unalterable
resolution, she quitted Malines the next morning, and with a heart too
honest to be utterly without comfort, paid that visit to her aunt which
had been so long deferred.

The pride of Lucille's parents prevented them from reproaching St.
Amand. He could not bear, however, their cold and altered looks; he left
their house; and though for several days he would not