ty, he
might preserve his life, if not obtain his liberty.

Not all the courtly blandishments of gallantry, nor even the
heart-breathed vows of true love could have been half so acceptable to
Isabel as this sacrifice of self-indulgence to filial duty. Even Neville
could not refrain from commending his nephew's conduct, while brushing a
tear from his eye he attempted to revive the expiring flame of
vindictive indignation. "The villain, then," said he, "knows now what it
is to want the service of a worthy child. Tell me, Eustace, does he
suffer deeply? Is his soul ground down with compunction by recollecting
the inhumed Neville, doomed by him and his rebel partizans to shelter
with the dead. Shut for years from the light of the sun, excluded from
human converse, and daily fed by that dear girl with the bread of
affliction, though born to stand before Kings, and sit as judge among
Princes! Walter De Vallance now suffers what I never endured. The
gnawing worm of remorse must inflict on him the agonies of despair, but
conscious innocence illumined my dungeon with hope. Yes, the spirits of
my ancestors, offended at the foul pollution of their pure ermine, point
at my son as the restorer of their tarnished honours, and bid me exult
in the agonies which await the death-bed of a villain!"

A look of grave rebuke from Dr. Beaumont recalled the much-agitated
Neville from this delirium of indulged malevolence. "My brother and my
friend," he exclaimed; "supporter of my frail existence, and guide of my
soul! I have sinned, pray for me." "May Almighty mercy," replied the
pious minister of Heaven, "grant you that peace which only those can
feel who are in charity with all mankind!--If years of affliction have
not so taught you the comparative worthlessness of temporal possessions
as to prevent your making them a pretext for eternal enmity; if calamity
has steeled your heart to pity instead of melting it to contrition, I
must bid you fear, lest some more terrible trials should visit you, or
what is worse, lest the sinner who will not pardon an offending brother
should be suddenly called to account for his own unrepented
transgressions against the God, not then of infinite compassion, but of
most righteous vengeance."

Neville trembled violently. His affectionate children intreated Dr.
Beaumont to spare his infirmities, but he answered, that regard for the
mortal body must not, in this instance, make him overlook the more
important co