ild.'

"Paul, who had never before heard this last expression, inquired with
eagerness its meaning. His mother replied, 'You had no legitimate father.
When I was a girl, seduced by love, I was guilty of a weakness of which you
are the offspring. My fault deprived you of the protection of a father's
family, and my flight from home, of that of a mother's family. Unfortunate
child! you have no relation in the world but me!' And she shed a flood of
tears. Paul, pressing her in his arms, exclaimed, 'Oh, my dear mother!
since I have no relation in the world but you, I will love you still more!
But what a secret have you disclosed to me! I now see the reason why
Mademoiselle de la Tour has estranged herself from me for two months past,
and why she has determined to go. Ah! I perceive too well that she despises
me!'

"'The hour of supper being arrived, we placed ourselves at table; but the
different sensations with which we were all agitated left us little
inclination to eat, and the meal passed in silence. Virginia first went
out, and seated herself on the very spot where we now are placed. Paul
hastened after her, and seated himself by her side. It was one of those
delicious nights which are so common between the tropics, and the beauty of
which no pencil can trace. The moon appeared in the midst of the firmament,
curtained in clouds which her beams gradually dispelled. Her light
insensibly spread itself over the mountains of the island, and their peaks
glistened with a silvered green. The winds were perfectly still. We heard
along the woods, at the bottom of the valleys, and on the summits of the
rocks, the weak cry and the soft murmurs of the birds, exulting in the
brightness of the night, and the serenity of the atmosphere. The hum of
insects was heard in the grass. The stars sparkled in the heavens, and
their trembling and lucid orbs were reflected upon the bosom of the ocean.
Virginia's eyes wandered over its vast and gloomy horizon, distinguishable
from the bay of the island by the red fires in the fishing boat. She
perceived at the entrance of the harbour a light and a shadow: these were
the watch-light and the body of the vessel in which she was to embark for
Europe, and which, ready to set sail, lay at anchor, waiting for the wind.
Affected at this sight, she turned away her head, in order to hide her
tears from Paul.

"Madame de la Tour, Margaret, and myself were seated at a little distance
beneath the plantain tr