sy world about me; and I have been
prompted by the old memories still clinging around me, to proffer you
the counsel of a friend. Will you forgive me, if I address you
candidly and unreservedly?"

And then, as Theresa wonderingly granted the desired permission, she
proceeded gently to detail some of the efforts of malice, and to utter
words of kind warning to one who, enfolded within her own illusions,
saw nothing of the shadows gathering about her path.

"You are not happy, Theresa!" continued the sister; "I know too much
of woman's life to believe you are. I am aware of the motives from
which you act; and while I reverence your purity of heart, and the
pride which has tempted you to work out your own destiny, I easily
trace the weariness your spirit feels. I, too, have had my visions;
they are God's gift to youth, but I have lived sadly and patiently to
watch dream after dream fade away. I see you have forgotten me,
although I saw you frequently at the convent of ----; but I am not
surprised at your forgetfulness, for the nun's sombre veil shuts her
out alike from hearts and memories."

"Are you, too, then unhappy?" asked Theresa, as the low and musical
voice beside her trembled in its tone; "you, whose footsteps are
followed by blessings, whose life is hallowed by doing good? I have
long ago learned to doubt the peace of the cloister, but I have ever
loved to believe there was recompense in your more active career, and
that if happiness exists on earth, the Sisters of Charity deserve and
win it."

"In part, you are right," answered the nun, "but you have yet to
realize that the penalties of humanity are beyond mortal control; that
we cannot, by any mode of life, pass beyond their influence. All we
_can_ do, is prayerfully to acquire patient forbearance and upward
hope; many a heavy heart beats beneath a veil like this, and carries
its own woes silently within, while it whispers to others of promise
and rest." The visiter paused, and Theresa interrupted a silence that
began to be painful to both.

"I feel," she said, "that I have acted injudiciously in braving
remark, and in proudly dreaming I could shape out my own course. But
you, who seem to have divined my thoughts so truly, doubtless read
also the _one_ reason which renders my return home most depressing."

"I know it well," was the reply; and the speaker pressed Theresa's
trembling hand within her own, "but your prolonged stay here will be
fraught with c