ful character, and
furnished them with excuses for their preoccupation, their disquiet, and
their retired life.

Madame de Tecle, who reproached herself with the misfortunes of her
daughter, as her own work, and who condemned herself with an unspeakable
bitterness, did not cease to search, in the midst of those ruins of the
past and of the present, some reparation, some refuge for the future.
The first idea which presented itself to her imagination had been to
separate absolutely, and at any cost, the Countess from her husband.
Under the first shock of fright which the duplicity of Camors had
inflicted upon her, she could not dwell without horror on the thought
of replacing her child at the side of such a man. But this
separation-supposing they could obtain it, through the consent of M. de
Camors, or the authority of the law--would give to the public a secret
scandal, and might entail redoubled catastrophes. Were it not for these
consequences she would, at least, have dug between Madame de Camors and
her husband an eternal abyss. Madame de Tecle did not desire this. By
force of reflection she had finally seen through the character of M. de
Camors in one day--not probably more favorably, but more truly. Madame
de Tecle, although a stranger to all wickedness, knew the world and knew
life, and her penetrating intelligence divined yet more than she knew
certainly. She then very nearly understood what species of moral monster
M. de Camors was. Such as she understood him, she hoped something from
him still. However, the condition of the Countess offered her some
consolation in the future, which she ought not to risk depriving herself
of; and God might permit that this pledge of this unfortunate union
might some day reunite the severed ties.

Madame de Tecle, in communicating her reflections, her hopes, and her
fears to her daughter, added: "My poor child, I have almost lost the
right to give you counsel; but I tell you, were it myself I should act
thus."

"Very well, mother, I shall do so," replied the young woman.

"Reflect well on it first, for the situation which you are about to
accept will have much bitterness in it; but we have only a choice of
evils."

At the close of this conversation, and eight days after their arrival in
the country, Madame de Tecle wrote M. de Camors a letter, which she read
to her daughter, who approved it.

"I understood you to say, that you would restore to your wife her
liberty if