band. If I am wrong, may a
merciful God forgive me. The words are uttered, and cannot be recalled.
I cannot add perjury to the dark list of my transgressions. Farewell,
mother; farewell, Gabriella; pray for me. Your prayers will call down
ministering angels, who shall come to me in the hour of nature's agony,
to relieve and sustain me."

He left us, closed the door, and passed down the stairs, which gave a
faint echo to his retreating footsteps. We looked at each other in grief
and amazement, and neither of us spoke for several minutes.

"My poor, misguided boy!" at length burst from his mother's pale lips,
"I fear I was too harsh,--I probed him too deeply,--I have driven him to
the verge of madness. Oh! how difficult it is to deal with a spirit so
strangely, so unhappily constituted! I have tried indulgence, and the
evil seemed to grow with alarming rapidity. I have exercised a parent's
authority, and behold the result. I can do nothing now, but obey his
parting injunction,--pray for him."

She folded her hands across her knees, and looked down in deep,
revolving thought.

Forty days of gloom and estrangement! Forty days! Oh! what a wilderness
would life be during those long, long days! And what was there beyond? I
dared not think. A dreary shadow of coming desolation,--like the cold,
gray mist which wrapped me as I stood on the rocks of Niagara, hung over
the future. Would I lift it if I could? Oh, no! Perish the hand that
would anticipate the day of God's revealing.

CHAPTER XLVII.

Ernest, faithful to his vow, slept on the floor in the library, and
though he sat down at the table with us, he tasted nothing but bread and
water. A stranger might not have observed any striking difference in his
manners, but he had forbidden himself even the glance of affection, and
his eye studiously and severely avoided mine. From the table he returned
to the library, and shut himself up till the next bell summoned us to
our now joyless and uncomfortable meals.

I cannot describe the tortures I endured during this season of unnatural
and horrible constraint. It sometimes seemed as if I should grow crazy;
and poor Edith was scarcely less unhappy. It was now that Mrs. Linwood
showed her extraordinary powers of self-control, her wisdom, and
intellectual strength. Calmly and serenely she fulfilled her usual
duties, as mistress of her household and benefactress of the village. To
visitors and friends she was the same hospit