er novitiate. This being completed, she had returned home,
in compliance with the precepts of the order, to mix in the world and
its pleasures for three months,--the abandonment of such temptation
being accepted as the best evidence of fitness for the last solemn vow.
Dangerous as such an ordeal would seem, yet scarcely ever is one found
to fail under it. The long previous training of the mind, the deep
impression made by a life of unbroken devotion, and that isolation
that comes of a conventual existence, joined to the sense of disgrace
attendant on desertion, all combined to make the novice faithful to her
first pledge. The trial is, therefore, little other than a formality,
and she who goes through it seems rather a martyr suffering torture,
than a youthful spirit taking its last fleeting glimpse of joy forever!

To fulfil this accustomed ceremonial--for it was simply such--Margot
came home to her father's house. The violent spirit of the Revolutionary
period had given way to a more calm and dispassionate tone, and already
the possessors of ancient names and titles were returning to the respect
they once were held in. In the little village of Linange the old Marquis
was now esteemed a high personage,--by some, indeed, was he placed above
the "Maire" himself. To do his daughter honor was, therefore, a duty;
and every one whose rank gave them the pretension, endeavored to show
her some mark of respect and attention. Small as the community was, it
had its dignitaries and its leaders, and they vied with each other on
this occasion.

Margot had been a favorite, she was about to be a nun,--two claims which
appeal to the heart by separate roads; for, while one exacts admiration,
the other disarms jealousy. Thus, even they who would have felt the
rivalry of her beauty as a subject of irritation, could now bestow their
praises on her without a pang. This flattery of admiration from every
quarter was too much for the brain of one whose chief fault was vanity.
The splendor of her dress, the presents lavished on her, the worship
which reached her wherever she went, all served to heighten the
fascination; and while Ursule prayed and entreated her to remember that
these were but as the flowers that deck the victim at the altar, she
would not heed her. How could she? Was not the swell of approving
voices which met her in society louder than the faint whisperings of her
sister's admonition? How could the cold warnings of prudence st