mpanionship evidently exercised upon
her son. In Camilla's presence he was quieter and more cheerful; and at
the same time more gentle in his manner to herself, which had often
been abrupt and violent. He also controlled his feelings with a mastery
which was doubly surprising in such an irritable invalid. And, lastly,
the Queen-regent, supposing that his inclination should indeed ripen to
earnest love, would not be averse to an alliance which promised
completely to win the Roman aristocracy, and erase all memory of a
cruel deed.

In Camilla a wonderful change was going forward. Day by day, as she
more and more clearly saw the noble tenderness, the gifted soul, and
the deep and poetical feelings of the young King develop, she felt her
hate melt away. With difficulty she recalled to her memory the fate of
her father, as an antidote to this sweet poison; she learnt better to
distinguish justly which of the Goths and Amelungs had contributed to
that fate, and, with growing certainty, she felt that it was unjust to
hate Athalaric for a misfortune which he had merely not opposed, and
indeed would hardly have been able to prevent. She would have liked,
long ago, to speak to him openly, but she mistrusted her own weakness;
she shunned it as a sin against father, fatherland, and her own
freedom; she trembled as she felt how indispensable this noble youth
had become to her, how much she thirsted to hear his melodious voice,
and look into his dark and thoughtful eyes. She feared this sinful
love--which she could now scarcely conceal from herself--and she would
not part with the only weapon that remained to her: the reproach of his
passive acquiescence in her father's death.

So she fluctuated from feeling to feeling; all the more hesitatingly,
the more mysterious Athalaric's strange reserve became. After all that
had happened, she could not doubt that he loved her; and yet--

Not a syllable, not a look betrayed this love. The exclamation with
which he had left her at the Temple of Venus was the most important,
the only important speech that had escaped him. She could not suspect
what the youth had suffered before his love had become not
extinguished, but self-denying. And still less in what new feeling he
had found manly strength enough for such renunciation.

Her mother, who watched Athalaric with all the keenness of hate, and,
in doing so, forgot to observe her own child, appeared even more
astonished at his coldness.

"Bu