y life and heart; shut out from joy
and hope in one brief hour, unlike it ever to be brightened again."

"Oh! Florry, dear Florry! turn to God for comfort and succor in this
hour of need. He will enable you to bear this trial, and go steadily
on in the path of duty."

"Mary, I have no incitement to exertion; nothing to anticipate. My
future is blank and dreary. I know my lot in life; I have nothing to
hope for."

"Not so, Florry. Your future life will be an active one. Are we not
dependent on our exertions for subsistence? and does not our little
school open to-morrow? Cheer up, darling all may yet be bright.
Bury the painful remembrances of the past; believe me, peace, if not
joyousness, will surely follow the discharge of your duties."

"I cannot forget the past. Had he sought my love, I could scorn him
for his baseness; but it is not so, I almost wish it were. Yet I know
and feel that he loves me; and oblivion of the past is as impossible
for him as, myself. I know not what strange impulse has induced me to
tell you all this. I did it half unconsciously, hoping for relief by
revealing that which has pressed so heavily on my heart. Mary, never
speak to me of it again; and, above all, do not mention his name. It
has passed my lips for the last time, and all shall be locked again
within my own heart. We will open the school to-morrow; and may God
help me, Mary, pray, oh, pray for me! I had no mother to teach me, and
prayer is a stranger to my lips."

She walked hurriedly to the house, and shut herself within her own
apartment.

CHAPTER XIII.

"Freedom calls you! Quick! be ready:
Think of what your sires have been:
Onward! onward! strong and steady,
Drive the tyrant to his den."

PERCIVAL.

How intoxicating is the love of power; and how madly the votaries
of ambition whirl to the vortex of that moral Corbrechtan, which has
ingulfed so many hapless victims. Our own noble Washington stands
forth a bright beacon to warn every ruler, civil or military, of the
thundering whirlpool. Father of your country! you stand alone on
the pedestal of greatness; and slowly rolling years shall pour their
waters into the boundless deep of eternity ere another shall be placed
beside you.

When Iturbide attempted to free his oppressed countrymen from the
crushing yoke of Spanish thraldom, Liberty was the watchword. Success
crowned his efforts--sovereign power lay before him. He grasped it,
and made hi