an uncertain, faltering
footstep that denoted considerable intoxication. To avoid him she turned
to the right with the purpose of making a circuit; but, before she had
gone ten yards with that intention, she perceived that the stranger had
quickened his pace and changed his direction, coming directly towards
her. Exceedingly alarmed, she turned short round and ran, and in a
moment perceived that her pursuer was likewise running, and rapidly
gaining upon her. Fear lent her speed, and with the swiftness of a
hunted deer she flew across the plaza towards an open space, terminated
at its further extremity by the precipitous cliff that the town is built
upon, and which we have mentioned more than once. Her intention was to
turn quickly round the corner of a house that stood within four feet of
the edge of the cliff, and gain another street; or, if there were no
other means of escape, to take refuge in the house of a poor widow, one
of her pensioners, and obtain a guide and protector to her uncle's
house.

Her pursuer was no other than her self-constituted lover, Don Gregorio.
He had dined that day with a party of officers, and had dipped rather
deeper into the bottle than, to tell the truth, he was often guilty of
doing. He suspected that Isabella was in the habit of visiting the
prison; but as she was generally accompanied, in all her rambles, by one
or both her cousins, he had thought nothing more of the circumstance.
But now he was convinced that she was just returning from, or going to,
a nocturnal appointment with the prisoner Morton, who had always been an
object of his hatred, and in an instant his jealousy was in full
operation.

The cliff, towards which he was now approaching, was undefended by wall,
fence, or barrier of any kind. My readers have doubtless seen something
similar in their lives; that is, a nuisance that has acquired such a
venerable character from its antiquity, that it seems a species of
sacrilege, a sort of violation of municipal privileges, to remove or
repair it. Such, for instance, in city or country, is a gap in the
street or road, large enough to swallow a brace of elephants at once:
the inhabitants become acquainted with its localities; and, wisely
considering that, as it is _every_ body's business, of course it is
_no_ body's business, to repair it, leave it "open for the inspection of
the public" for a twelvemonth at least; and if any unfortunate stranger
tumbles in and breaks his neck, o