hem.

Mrs. Linwood was the first to recognize my presence; she raised her head
and beckoned me to approach. As I obeyed her motion, Ernest rose from
his knees, and taking my hand, held it for a moment closely, firmly in
his own; he did not embrace me, as he had always done in the transports
of reconciliation; he seemed to hold me from him in that controlling
grasp, and there was something thrilling, yet repelling, in the dark
depths of his eyes that held me bound to the spot where I stood.

"Remain with my mother, Gabriella," said he; "I give you back to her
guardianship, till I have done penance for the sins of this night. The
lips that have dared to speak to a mother, and such a mother, the words
of bitterness and passion, are unworthy to receive the pledge of love.
My eyes are opened to the enormity of my offence, and I abhor myself in
dust and ashes; my spirit shall clothe itself in garments of sackcloth
and mourning, and drink of the bitter cup of humiliation. Hear, then, my
solemn vow;--nay, my mother, nay, Gabriella,--I must, I will speak. My
Saviour fasted forty days and forty nights in the wilderness, he, who
knew not sin, and shall not I, vile as a malefactor, accursed as a
leper, do something to prove my penitence and self-abasement? For forty
days I abjure love, joy, domestic endearments, and social pleasures,--I
will live on bread and water,--I will sleep on the uncarpeted floor,--or
pass my nights under the canopy of heaven."

Pale and shuddering I listened to this wild, stem vow, fearing that his
reason was forsaking him. No martyr at the stake ever wore an expression
of more sublime self-sacrifice.

"Alas, my son!" exclaimed his mother, "one tear such as you have shed
this hour is worth a hundred rash vows. Vain and useless are they as the
iron bed, the girdle of steel, the scourge of the fanatic, who expects
to force by self-inflicted tortures the gates of heaven to open. Do you
realize to what sufferings you are dooming the hearts that love you, and
whose happiness is bound up in yours? Do you realize that you are making
our home dark and gloomy as the dungeons of the Inquisition?"

"Not so, my mother; Gabriella shall be free as air, free as before she
breathed her marriage vows. To your care I commit her. Let not one
thought of me cloud the sunshine of the domestic board, or wither one
garland of household joy. I have imposed this penance on myself in
expiation of my offences as a son and as a hus