gy; "for the empire never lasts.
We are slaves to the empire we would found; we wish to be loved, but
we only succeed in loving too well ourselves. We lay up our all--our
thoughts, hopes, emotions-all the treasures of our hearts--in one spot;
and when we would retire from the deceits and cares of life, we find the
sanctuary walled against us--we love, and are loved no longer!"

Constance had turned round with the earnestness of the feeling she
expressed; and her eyes, still wet with tears, her flushed cheek, her
quivering lip, struck to Radclyffe's heart more than her words. He rose
involuntarily; his own agitation was marked; he moved several
steps towards Constance, and then checked the impulse, and muttered
indistinctly to himself.

"No," said Constance, mournfully, and scarcely heeding him--"it is in
vain for us to be ambitious. We only deceive ourselves; we are not
stern and harsh enough for the passion. Touch our affections, and we are
recalled at once to the sense of our weakness; and I--I--would to God
that I were a humble peasant girl, and not--not what I am!"

So saying, the lofty Constance sank down, overpowered with the
bitterness of her feelings, and covered her face with her hands. Was
Radclyffe a man that he could see this unmoved?--that he could hear
those beautiful lips breathe complaints for the want of love, and not
acknowledge the love that burned at his own heart? Long, secretly,
resolutely, had he struggled against the passion for Constance, which
his frequent intercourse with her had fed, and which his consciousness,
that in her was the only parallel to himself that he had ever met with
in her sex, had first led him to form; and now lone, neglected, sad,
this haughty woman wept over her unloved lot in his presence, and still
he was not at her feet! He spoke not, moved not, but his breath heaved
thick, and his face was as pale as death. He conquered himself.
All within Radclyffe obeyed the idol he had worshipped, even before
Constance; all within him, if ardent and fiery, was also high and
generous. The acuteness of his reason permitted him no self-sophistried;
and he would have laid his head on the block rather than breathe a word
of that love which he knew, from the moment it was confessed, would
become unworthy of Constance and himself.

There was a pause. Lady Erpingham, ashamed, confounded at her own
weakness, recovered herself slowly and in silence. Radclyffe at length
spoke; and his voic