e
warm blood of the heart rushing through all the delicate coatings of
pearl-powder. "If every Frenchman felt as you do; if in this Paris of
ours all hostilities of class may merge in the one thought of the common
country; if in French hearts there yet thrills the same sentiment as
that which, in the terrible days when all other ties were rent asunder,
revered France as mother, and rallied her sons to her aid against the
confederacy of Europe,--why, then, we need not grow pale with dismay
at the sight of a Prussian needle-gun. Hist! look yonder: is not that a
tableau of Youth in Arcady? Worlds rage around, and Love, unconcerned,
whispers to Love!" The Duchesse here pointed to a corner of the
adjoining room in which Alain and Valerie sat apart, he whispering into
her ear; her cheek downcast, and, even seen at that distance, brightened
by the delicate tenderness of its blushes.

CHAPTER III.

But in that small assembly there were two who did not attract the notice
of Duplessis or of the lady of the Imperial Court. While the Prince ----
and the placid Looker-on were engaged at a contest of ecarte, with the
lively Venosta, for the gallery, interposing criticisms and admonitions,
Isaura was listlessly turning over a collection of photographs, strewed
on a table that stood near to an open window in the remoter angle of the
room, communicating with a long and wide balcony filled partially
with flowers and overlooking the Champs Elysees, softly lit up by the
innumerable summer stars. Suddenly a whisper, the command of which she
could not resist, thrilled through her ear, and sent the blood rushing
back to her heart.

"Do you remember that evening at Enghien? how I said that our
imagination could not carry us beyond the question whether we two should
be gazing together that night twelve months on that star which each of
us had singled out from the hosts of heaven? That was the 8th of
July. It is the 8th of July once more. Come and seek for our chosen
star--come. I have something to say, which say I must. Come."

Mechanically, as it were,--mechanically, as they tell us the
Somnambulist obeys the Mesmeriser,--Isaura obeyed that summons. In a
kind of dreamy submission she followed his steps, and found herself on
the balcony, flowers around her and stars above, by the side of the man
who had been to her that being ever surrounded by flowers and lighted by
stars,--the ideal of Romance to the heart of virgin Woman.

"Isaur