e the dormant
affection and prove its nobility and its power; but in our experience
manifest fraternal charity is one of those things even the wise man
knew to be rare under the sun. Where we have been privileged to look
in behind the veil of the family circle, we are more convinced than
ever that fraternal affection an all the boasted nobility of sisterly
love dwindle down to a series of petty quarrels and jealousies as
painful as they are unchristian and unbecoming. The reserve, or rather
the hypocrisy of politeness, put on before strangers, is no criterion
of the inward domestic life. Some one has said of ladies, "A point
yielded or a pardon begged in public means so many hair-pullings
behind the scenes." But this is too sweeping; there are noble, glorious
exceptions in families where religion reigns, where fraternal charity
finds a congenial soil; for it blooms in the fragrance of the other
virtues, and is the first characteristic of a pious family. The world
around are told to look for this as a sign by which they are to
recognize the disciples of Him who loved so much.

Aloysia, in a true, genuine feeling of love, was bound in adamantine
chains to her sister. Time and fortune, that shatter all human
institutions and prove human feelings, consolidated the union of their
hearts and their destinies. A stranger on stronger proof of the
influence of sisterly affection could not be adduced; it dragged the
beautiful, blushing Aloysia from the sphere of girlhood, to follow
in the track of hypocrisy and of bloodshed so desperately trodden by
her brave sister.

Our tale opens when the two girls had finished their education and
were living in luxury and enjoyment. The days and hours passed merrily
by. They would read in the shade, play and sing on the harp, would
paint or work at wool, and in the afternoon, when the burning sun had
left the world to the shade of evening, they would drive out in a
magnificent attelage to the fashionable rendezvous of Paris.

Dream too bright to last! On the horizon is gathering the dark cloud
that will dim the sunlight of their bliss, and cause them, in the dark
and trying hour of trouble, to look back with the sigh of regret over
the brilliant hours of youthful enjoyment.

Chapter VI.

A Secret Revealed.

I thought to pass away before, and yet alive I am;
And in the fields all round I hear the bleating of the lamb.
How sadly, I remember, rose the morning of th