half laugh pursued: "The fact is, Charles, I
have been so much used to listen to your warm and eloquent praises of
your sister, I have absolutely, I will not say fallen in love with
(that would be going too far), but conceived so strong an interest in
her, that my most ardent desire would be to find favour in her eyes.
What say you, my friend? are you inclined to forward my suit; and if
so, is there any chance for me, think you, with herself?"

The breast of Charles de Haldimar, who had listened with deep and
increasing attention to this avowal, swelled high with pleasurable
excitement, and raising himself up in his bed with one hand, while he
grasped one of Sir Everard's with the other, he exclaimed with a
transport of affection too forcible to be controlled,--

"Oh, Valletort, Valletort! this is, indeed, all that was wanting to
complete my happiness. My sister Clara I adore with all the affection
of my nature; I love her better than my own life, which is wrapped up
in hers. She is an angel in disposition,--all that is dear, tender, and
affectionate,--all that is gentle and lovely in woman; one whose
welfare is dearer far to me than my own, and without whose presence I
could not live. Valletort, that prize,--that treasure, that dearer half
of myself, is yours,--yours for ever. I have long wished you should
love, each other, and I felt, when you met, you would. If I have
hitherto forborne from expressing this fondest wish of my heart, it has
been from delicacy--from a natural fear of compromising the purity of
my adored Clara. Now, however, you have confessed yourself interested,
by a description that falls far short of the true peril of that dear
girl, I can no longer disguise my gratification and delight.
Valletort," he concluded, impressively, "there is no other man on earth
to whom I would say so much; but you were formed for each other, and
you will, you must, be the husband of my sister."

If the youthful and affectionate De Haldimar was happy, Sir Everard was
no less so; for already, with the enthusiasm of a young man of twenty,
he painted to himself the entire fruition of those dreams of happiness
that had so long been familiarised to his imagination. One doubt alone
crossed his mind.

"But if your sister should have decided differently, Charles," he at
length remarked, as he gently quitted the embrace of his friend: "who
knows if her heart may not already throb for another; and even if not,
it is possible