attachment. I had not meant to have said so much in such a place; but if you have any compassion for me, let me see you again. I have much to tell you." "Indeed I cannot promise. some days," said Ethel, hurriedly.

I am engaged for

"I know you are until after the marriage; but then you will be at liberty."

"Indeed it is better we should not meet again. My answer must be what I before told you,” replied Ethel.

"And do you despise me so much as to deny me this request?" he said, in a constrained voice.

66

Oh, no! far from that," Ethel replied. "Then you must not deny me.

Ethel-dear Ethel you cannot tell all I feel for you," he said. She felt him take her hand and press it tenderly. How could she withdraw it, feeling but too well how her heart echoed a reply? There had been some slight delay about the carriage, which had occasioned them to withdraw from the draught of the door, and enabled Raymond to say all he had done; but Mr. Woodville had now handed Laura in, and Ethel was ready to step forward.

"Then I shall see you?" were Raymond's parting words.

"It will be of no use. I dare not change," was Ethel's reply.

Another pressure of her hand and Raymond stepped back into the hall. The servant closed the door, and they drove away.

CHAPTER XVIII.

"Leave me! thou comest between my heart and heaven;
I would be still, in voiceless prayer to die.

Why must our souls thus love, and then be riven?
Return! thy parting wakes my agony!

delay!"- MRS. HEMANS.

Oh yet awhile

"By thy meek Spirit, Thou, of all that e'er have mourned the chief

Thou, Saviour! if the stroke must fall, hallow this grief."

IDEM.

"When afflictions cloud my sky, when the tide of sorrow flows, When thy rod is lifted high, let me on thy love repose: Stay thy rough wind when the chilling eastern blows."

JANE TAYLOR.

ALL seemed a dream of hopeless misery, from which she had no power to awake: this was the feeling of Ethel, as she ascended to her own room on returning from Thurlston. It was a bitter thought, that in her forgetfulness of duty she had destroyed Raymond's happiness as well as her own. Why had she not watched her heart? Why had she suffered herself to be thrown off her guard? Why had her affections been so overpowering as to lead her astray from the path of duty, in fixing themselves on an unbeliever? Had not her own mother's bitter experience and deep repentance been sufficient to guard her from such a step? How forgetful had she been of heavenly things of late! How her heart had been growing more and

more estranged from God, as the shadow of an earthly love had darkened her mind to a sense of heavenly love! Ethel felt and knew she had sinned, and deeply; and this was the bitter consequence and punishment. But even in this she thanked God that she had been recalled to a sense of her error before it was too late, and her fate united with one who "knew not Him." Long she sat -tearless, motionless, and silent — endeavouring to calm the chaos of her mind by stilling the tempest of sorrow and disappointment there, which threatened almost to deprive her of her senses and in broken, prayerful petitions for help to overcome this overwhelming shock. At length she was subdued, and able to approach on bended knee the God of whose precepts she had been of late so fearfully unmindful. And now Ethel found the sweet, the precious consolation of holding communion with the God-man, who has been tempted as his people, and has promised to hear and help them when they cry. It did not seem to her as if she were so lonely; another bore the burden as well as herself: one, too, who is not like an earthly being, and yet has the person of man, which enables him the more fully to sympathise and direct his people under trial, but who has none of the changefulness of man, who is ever "the same, yesterday, to-day, and for ever," and who "holds his people in everlasting remembrance."

Ethel poured out her soul to this compassionate Friend of sinners, and deeply did she repent and mourn over her sinful neglect of God, by allowing an earthly affection to gain such an ascendancy over

her.

The more she thought, the more she saw how inseparably Herbert Raymond had made himself dear to her heart. It was her first affection. Never

before had any one grown dear to her young heart as he had done, and she felt as if it were a love which years could not change. Still he ought to be given up. She had renounced the world; she professed to be a Christian. There was but one course for her to pursue. She must resign him--give up his love! And what a struggle was this! more especially contrasted with the home she had, and the few who cared for her, while he would do anything to make her life pleasant and her home happy. But he was an unbeliever! If not an avowed infidel to the world, he had, at least, confessed to her his doubts and growing unbelief, She knew what poignant grief it had caused her to hear him make that confession; but what were her feelings then to what they were now? They were agony. Her brain appeared to burn with her conflicting emotions; and sometimes her heart throbbed so wildly it seemed almost bursting.

Throughout the long, weary night of suffering, she sat rocking herself to and fro, sleep never once visiting her eyes. Quick revulsions of feeling succeeded one another; sometimes wavering, as she thought of their mutual affection, and then calmed and subdued again, when the pale, drooping form of her mother came before her, and her thin, wasted hand, uplifted in earnestness as she murmured,— "Ethel, promise me, whatever it may cost you, you will not marry one of whose religious opinions you are not well assured;" and her resolute answer,"I never will, by God's help!" little dreaming then, how soon her promise would be tried.

At length, as morning dawned, a heavenly, unchanging calm was sent.

She wavered no longer. She prayed once more for strength to "stand fast in the liberty wherewith

Christ had made her free;" and that she might be kept from the entanglement of that bondage of the world, which, in an unhallowed union, she knew it would be almost impossible to avoid. And she rose in the strength of that glorious promise, "My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness"-with a firm resolve that the sacrifice should be made, at whatever cost to her own earthly happiness, feeling how light it would be in comparison with risking her eternal salvation by uniting herself to an unbeliever.

For a short time she sunk to sleep; from which, however, she was soon roused by the maid, who came to call her; and, dreading lest any one should in the least suspect what was wrong, weak and weary as she was, she rose and prepared for breakfast. There was no marked difference in her manner, though her step was slower, and her face extremely pale, and with an expression of great fatigue resting on it.

Mr. Woodville, however, took no notice, though Harry perceived the change; but imagining it was the previous evening's dissipation, he rallied her good-humouredly, on gaiety having so much effect upon her appearance, and said, if it spoilt her beauty so much, he hoped she would never go out again.

It was better for Ethel that, for the next two days, everything was hurry and confusion previous to the wedding, for many arrangements had to be made which she must herself superintend. Ethel was, therefore, unable to dwell on any painful forebodings; the business of the day so absorbed and wearied her, that sleep (though it was a troubled rest) came, in spite of her misery, to relieve her worn-out and exhausted frame. Laura, unconscious of anything but her own selfish grief at her father's marriage, spent most of the