rved confidence bestowed upon him in a moment of
such agitation and sorrowful excitement.

"Be comforted, dear Isabelle," said he at last, tenderly. "I was not
killed you see, nor even hurt; and I actually wounded my adversary,
though he does pass for a tolerably good swordsman hereabouts, I
believe."

"Yes, I well know what a strong hand is yours, and what a brave, noble
heart," Isabelle replied; "and I do not scruple to acknowledge that I
love you for it with all my heart; feeling sure that you will respect
my frank avowal, and not endeavour to take advantage of it. When I
first saw you, de Sigognac, dispirited and desolate, in that dreary,
half-ruined chateau, where your youth was passing in sadness and
solitude, I felt a tender interest in you suddenly spring into being in
my heart; had you been happy and prosperous I should have been afraid of
you, and have shrunk timidly from your notice. When we walked together
in that neglected garden, where you held aside the brambles so carefully
for me to pass unscathed, you gathered and presented to me a little
wild rose--the only thing you had to give me. As I raised it to my lips,
before putting it in my bosom, and kissed it furtively under pretence of
inhaling its fragrance, I could not keep back a tear that dropped upon
it, and secretly and in silence I gave you my heart in exchange for it."

As these entrancing words fell upon his ear, de Sigognac impulsively
tried to kiss the sweet lips so temptingly near his own, but Isabelle
withdrew herself gently from his embrace; not with any show of excessive
prudery, but with a modest timidity that no really gallant lover would
endeavour to overcome by force.

"Yes, I love you, de Sigognac," she continued, in a voice that was
heavenly sweet, "and with all my heart, but not as other women love;
your glory is my aim, not my own pleasure. I am perfectly willing to be
looked upon as your mistress; it is the only thing that would account
satisfactorily to the world at large for your presence in this troupe of
strolling players. And why should I care for slanderous reports, so long
as I keep my own self-esteem, and know myself to be virtuous and true?
If there were really a stain upon my purity it would kill me; I could
not survive it. It is the princely blood in my veins doubtless that
gives rise to such pride in me; very ridiculous, perhaps, in an actress,
but such is my nature."

This enchanting avowal, which would not have ta