lia's house, was admitted and ushered
into a room, to await her arrival. My person had been set off to the
best advantage. I had put on a new wig, a splendid velvet cloak, silk
doublet and hose; and as I surveyed myself for a second or two in the
mirror, I felt the impossibility of recognition, mingled with pride at
my handsome contour. The door opened, and Donna Celia came in,
trembling with anxiety. I threw myself on my knees, and in a voice
apparently choked with emotion, demanded her blessing. She tottered to
the sofa overpowered by her feelings; and still remaining on my knees, I
seized her hand, which I covered with kisses.

"It is--it is my child," cried she at last; "all powerful nature would
have told me so, if it had not been proved," and she threw her arms
round my neck, as she bent over me and shed tears of gratitude and
delight. I do assure your highness that I caught the infection, and
mingled my tears with hers; for I felt then, and I even now firmly
believe, that I was her son. Although my conscience for a moment
upbraided me, during a scene which brought back virtuous feelings to my
breast, I could not but consider, that a deception which could produce
so much delight and joy, was almost pardonable. I took my seat beside
her, and she kissed me again and again, as one minute she would hold me
off to look at me, and the next strain me in her embraces.

"You are the image of your father, Pedro," observed she, mournfully,
"but God's will be done. If he has taken away, he also hath given, and
truly grateful am I for his bounty." When we had in some degree
recovered our agitation, I intreated her to narrate to me the history of
my father, of whom I had heard but little from the good brother Anselmo,
and she repeated to me those events of her youthful days which she had
communicated before.

"But you have not been introduced to Clara: the naughty girl little
thought that she was carrying on an amour with her own cousin."

When Donna Celia called her down, I made no scruple of pressing the dear
girl to my heart, and implanting a kiss upon her lips: with our eyes
beaming with love and joy, we sat down upon the sofa, I in the centre,
with a hand locked in the hand of each. "And now, my dear Pedro, I am
anxious to hear the narrative of your life," said Donna Celia: "that it
has been honourable to yourself, I feel convinced." Thanking her for
her good opinion, which I hoped neither what had passed, o