forms me."

"And you have refused,--is it not so?"

"Even so, Madame."

"How is this, sir? Are you so weary of a soldier's life, that you would
leave it thus early?"

"This was not the reason, Madame."

"You loved the Emperor, sir," said she, hastily, and with a tone of
almost passionate eagerness, "even as I loved my dear, kind mistress;
and you felt allegiance to be too sacred a thing to be bartered at a
moment's notice. Is this the true explanation?"

"I am proud to say, you have read my motives; such were they."

"Why are there not many more to act thus?" cried she, vehemently. "Why
do not the great names _he_ made glorious, become greater by fidelity
than ever they were by heroism? There was one, sir, who, had he lived,
had given this example to the world."

"True, most true, Madame. But was not his fate happier than to have
survived for this?"

A long pause, unbroken by a word on either side, followed; when at last
she said,--

"I had left with De Beauvais some few relics of my dear brother, hoping
you would accept them for his sake. General d'Auvergne's sword,--the
same he wore at Jena,--he desired might be conveyed to you when you left
the service. These, and this ring," said she, endeavoring to withdraw a
rich brilliant from her finger, "are the few souvenirs I would ask you
to keep for their sakes, and for mine. You mean to return to England,
sir?"

"Yes, Madame; that is, I had intended,--I know not now whither I shall
go. Country has few ties for one like me."

"I, too, must be a wanderer," said she, half musingly, while still
she endeavored to remove the ring from her finger. "I find," said she,
smiling, "I must give you another keepsake; this will not leave me."

"Give it me, then, where it is," said I. "Yes, Marie! the devotion of a
heart, wholly yours, should not go unrewarded. To you I owe all that
my life has known of happiness,--to memory of you, every high and noble
hope. Let me not, after years of such affection, lose the guiding star
of my existence,--all that I have lived for, all that I love!"

These words, poured forth with all the passionate energy which a last
hope inspires, were followed by a story of my long-concealed love. I
know not how incoherently the tale was told; I cannot say how often
I interrupted my own recital by some appeal to the past,--some
half-uttered hope that she had seen the passion which burned within me.
I can but remember the bursting feeling of my boso