knees, and startled him from
the ecstasy and surprise with which he had listened to this astounding
speech; he took it, and read the first letter written by Mademoiselle
Esther:--

To Monsieur l'Abbe Carlos Herrera.

"MY DEAR PROTECTOR,--Will you not suppose that gratitude is
stronger in me than love, when you see that the first use I make
of the power of expressing my thoughts is to thank you, instead of
devoting it to pouring forth a passion that Lucien has perhaps
forgotten. But to you, divine man, I can say what I should not
dare to tell him, who, to my joy, still clings to earth.

"Yesterday's ceremony has filled me with treasures of grace, and I
place my fate in your hands. Even if I must die far away from my
beloved, I shall die purified like the Magdalen, and my soul will
become to him the rival of his guardian angel. Can I ever forget
yesterday's festival? How could I wish to abdicate the glorious
throne to which I was raised? Yesterday I washed away every stain
in the waters of baptism, and received the Sacred Body of my
Redeemer; I am become one of His tabernacles. At that moment I
heard the songs of angels, I was more than a woman, born to a life
of light amid the acclamations of the whole earth, admired by the
world in a cloud of incense and prayers that were intoxicating,
adorned like a virgin for the Heavenly Spouse.

"Thus finding myself worthy of Lucien, which I had never hoped to
be, I abjured impure love and vowed to walk only in the paths of
virtue. If my flesh is weaker than my spirit, let it perish. Be
the arbiter of my destiny; and if I die, tell Lucien that I died
to him when I was born to God."

Lucien looked up at the Abbe with eyes full of tears.

"You know the rooms fat Caroline Bellefeuille had, in the Rue Taitbout,"
the Spaniard said. "The poor creature, cast off by her magistrate, was
in the greatest poverty; she was about to be sold up. I bought the place
all standing, and she turned out with her clothes. Esther, the angel who
aspired to heaven, has alighted there, and is waiting for you."

At this moment Lucien heard his horses pawing the ground in the
courtyard; he was incapable of expressing his admiration for a devotion
which he alone could appreciate; he threw himself into the arms of the
man he had insulted, made amends for all by a look and the speechless
effusion of his feelings. Then he flew downstairs, confided Esther's
a