t you after. I knew you at once. Am I changed? I swear to you
I have dreamed of you ever since, and love you. Be as faded as you like;
be hideous, if you like; but come with me. You know my name, and what I
am. Twice I have followed you, and found your name and address; twice I
have written to you, and made the same proposal. And you won't trust
to my honour? When I tell you I love you tenderly? When I give you my
solemn assurance that you shall not regret it? You have been deceived by
one man: why punish me? I know--I feel you are innocent and good. This
is the third time that you have permitted me to speak to you: let it
be final. Say you will trust yourself to me--trust in my honour. Say
it shall be to-morrow. Yes; say the word. To-morrow. My sweet
creature--do!"

The man spoke earnestly, but a third person and extraneous hearer could
hardly avoid being struck by the bathetic conclusion. At least, in tone
it bordered on a fall; but the woman did not feel it so.

She replied: "You mean kindly to me, sir. I thank you indeed, for I am
very friendless. Oh! pardon me: I am quite--quite determined. Go--pray,
forget me."

This was Dahlia's voice.

Robert was unconscious of having previously suspected it. Heartily
ashamed of letting his ears be filled with secret talk, he went from the
garden and crossed the street.

He knew this to be one of the temptations of young women in London.

Shortly after, the man came through the iron gateway of the garden. He
passed under lamplight, and Robert perceived him to be a gentleman in
garb.

A light appeared in the windows of the house. Now that he had heard
her voice, the terrors of his interview were dispersed, and he had only
plain sadness to encounter. He knocked at the door quietly. There was
a long delay after he had sent in his name; but finally admission was
given.

"If I had loved her!" groaned Robert, before he looked on her; but when
he did look on her, affectionate pity washed the selfish man out of
him. All these false sensations, peculiar to men, concerning the soiled
purity of woman, the lost innocence; the brand of shame upon her, which
are commonly the foul sentimentalism of such as can be too eager in
the chase of corruption when occasion suits, and are another side of
pruriency, not absolutely foreign to the best of us in our youth--all
passed away from him in Dahlia's presence.

The young man who can look on them we call fallen women with a noble
eye, is