of in the mistress, and exact from
the wife,--all, even more, far more, than the exquisite form and the
delicate graces of the less durable beauty, returned to him, after every
struggle with himself; and time only seemed to grave, in deeper if more
latent folds of his heart, the ineradicable impression.

Maltravers renewed his acquaintance with some persons not unfamiliar to
the reader.

Valerie de Ventadour--how many recollections of the fairer days of life
were connected with that name! Precisely as she had never reached to
his love, but only excited his fancy (the fancy of twenty-two), had her
image always retained a pleasant and grateful hue; it was blended with
no deep sorrow, no stern regret, no dark remorse, no haunting shame.

They met again. Madame de Ventadour was still beautiful, and still
admired,--perhaps more admired than ever; for to the great, fashion and
celebrity bring a second and yet more popular youth. But Maltravers, if
rejoiced to see how gently Time had dealt with the fair Frenchwoman,
was yet more pleased to read in her fine features a more serene and
contented expression than they had formerly worn. Valerie de Ventadour
had preceded her younger admirer through the "MYSTERIES of LIFE;" she
had learned the real objects of being; she distinguished between the
Actual and the Visionary, the Shadow and the Substance; she had acquired
content for the present, and looked with quiet hope towards the future.
Her character was still spotless; or rather, every year of temptation
and trial had given it a fairer lustre. Love, that might have ruined,
being once subdued, preserved her from all after danger. The first
meeting between Maltravers and Valerie was, it is true, one of some
embarrassment and reserve: not so the second. They did but once, and
that slightly, recur to the past, and from that moment, as by a
tacit understanding, true friendship between them dated. Neither felt
mortified to see that an illusion had passed away,--they were no longer
the same in each other's eyes. Both might be improved, and were so;
but the Valerie and the Ernest of Naples were as things dead and gone!
Perhaps Valerie's heart was even more reconciled to the cure of its soft
and luxurious malady by the renewal of their acquaintance. The mature
and experienced reasoner, in whom enthusiasm had undergone its usual
change, with the calm brow and commanding aspect of sober manhood, was
a being so different from the romantic bo