prosaical remarks, which must have ill
accorded with the poet's sublime rhapsodies, and endeavoured to force
on her imagination some of those strange feelings, which she supposed
might resemble the unpleasant sensations caused by a cold in the head,
derangement of the stomach--and having worked herself up to a state of
nervous excitement, she sat down to her escritoire, and began a long
letter to her bridegroom.

As she was in the act of revising a composition which she herself
scarcely understood, her maid entered the room with a letter.

Annoyed at being interrupted, Julia snatched it from her hand, and
glancing hurriedly at the address, recognised Kalman's handwriting.

Seriously alarmed, she held the letter in her hand without daring to
break the seal, in case she should read: "When these lines meet your
eye, the writer will be"--the thought was too horrible! Motioning to
her maid to quit the room, she opened the epistle with a trembling
hand: there were four pages closely written.

"ADORABLE JULIA!--Angel never to be forgotten!--Have you ever seen two
stars so close to one another in the blue vault of heaven, that with
the naked eye you might take them to be but one, and which, ever since
their creation, have been revolving round one another--when suddenly
an unexpected phenomenon takes place: one of these two stars, impelled
by an irresistible power, quits his companion, and rushing forward
through the universe, becomes a comet, whose fate is to wander beyond
the worlds, threatening the trembling stars with destruction." . . . .

Julia's patience was not sufficient to go through four pages of
astronomy, and turning impatiently to the end of the letter, she read
as follows:--

"As my father's wishes in regard to me are iron fetters, which enchain
me like Prometheus to the rock; and since he absolutely insists upon
my marrying the daughter of Gabor Berkessy, pronotarius of the county
of Csongrad, there remains no alternative but to die or--to obey. Were
I to consider myself alone, it were bliss to choose the former. But I
can think of you alone--the despair, the derangement, probably, my
selfishness might cause you; and therefore I live and obey for your
sake, my adorable Julia! for your peace alone; and with tears in my
eyes, and anguish in my heart, trace these few lines, each word of
which is a dagger in the soul of him who can never forget, and lives
alone in your remembrance.