e were whelmed in a
common ruin.

No account has been transmitted to us of De Soto's return voyage.
While he was in Peru, Don Pedro had died. His sick-bed was a scene of
lingering agony, both of body and of mind. The proud spirit is
sometimes vanquished and crushed by remorse; but it is never, by those
scorpion lashes, subdued, and rendered humble and gentle and lovable.
The dying sinner, whose soul was crimsoned with guilt, was
overwhelmed with "a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery
indignation." The ecclesiastics, who surrounded his death-bed, assured
him that such sins as he had been guilty of could only be expiated by
the most liberal benefactions to the church. He had never forgiven
Isabella for her pertinacious adherence to De Soto. In the grave he
could not prohibit their nuptials. By bequeathing his wealth to the
church, he could accomplish a double object. He could gratify his
revenge by leaving his daughter penniless, and thus De Soto, if he
continued faithful, would be compelled to receive to his arms a
dowerless bride; and a miserable superstition taught him that he could
thus bribe God to throw open to him the gates of paradise.

Don Pedro's eldest daughter, Maria, was engaged to be married to Vasco
Nunez, the very worthy governor who had preceded Don Pedro at Darien,
and whom he had so infamously beheaded. She had spent fifteen years in
her father's castle in the gloom and tears of this cruel widowhood.
Don Pedro bequeathed nearly all his fortune to the endowment of a
monastery, over which Maria was appointed abbess. Isabella was left
unprovided for. Thus suddenly the relative position of the two lovers
was entirely changed. De Soto found himself in possession of large
wealth. Isabella was reduced to poverty. We know not where to find,
in the annals of history, the record of a more beautiful attachment
than that which, during fifteen years of separation, trial, and sorest
temptations, had united the hearts of De Soto and Isabella. Their love
commenced when they were children, walking hand in hand, and playing
in the bowers of Don Pedro's ancestral castle.

De Soto had now attained the age of thirty-five years. Isabella was
only a few years younger. When we contemplate her youth, her beauty,
the long years of absence, without even a verbal message passing
between them, the deadly hostility of her father to the union, and the
fact that her hand had been repeatedly solicited by the most wealt