mporte-moi dans un reve amoureux,
Bien loin sur la terre inconnue,
Pour que longtemps, meme en rouvrant les yeux,
Ce reve continue.

Croyons, aimons, vivons un jour;
C'est si bon, mais si court!
Bonheur de vivre ici-bas diminue
Dans un moment d'amour.

The Hour of Love! How full of burning love and sentiment! She stopped,
reflecting on the meaning of those words.

She was not like the average miss who, parrot-like, knows only a few
French or Italian songs. Italian she loved even better than French, and
could read Dante and Petrarch in the original, while she possessed an
intimate knowledge of the poetry of Italy from the mediaeval writers
down to Carducci and D'Annunzio.

With a sigh, she glanced around the small room, with its old-fashioned
furniture, its antimacassars of the early Victorian era, its wax flowers
under their glass dome, and its gipsy-table covered with a
hand-embroidered cloth. It was all so very dispiriting. The primness of
the whatnot decorated with pieces of treasured china, the big
gilt-framed overmantel, and the old punch-bowl filled with pot-pourri,
all spoke mutely of the thin-nosed old spinster to whom the veriest
speck of dust was an abomination.

Sighing still again, the girl turned once more to the old-fashioned
instrument, with its faded crimson silk behind the walnut fretwork, and,
playing the plaintive melody, sang an ancient serenade:

Di questo cor tu m'hai ferito il core
A cento colpi, piu non val mentire.
Pensa che non sopporto piu il dolore,
E se segu cosi, vado a morire.
Ti tengo nella mente a tutte l'ore,
Se lavoro, se velio, o sto a dormre ...
E mentre dormo ancora un sonno grato,
Mi trovo tutto lacrime bagnato!

While she sang, there was a rap at the front-door, and, just as she
concluded, the prim maid entered with a letter upon a salver.

In an instant her heart gave a bound. She recognised the handwriting. It
was Walter's.

The moment the girl had left the room she tore open the envelope, and,
holding her breath, read what was written within.

The words were:

"DEAREST HEART,--Your letter came to me after several wanderings. It has
caused me to think and to wonder if, after all, I may be mistaken--if,
after all, I have misjudged you, darling. I gave you my heart, it is
true. But you spurned it--under compulsion, you say! Why under
compulsion? Who is it who compels you to act against your will and
ag