A lively sentiment passed through Petrea's heart.

"Thou art happy, little bird," thought she; "so many beings are happy.
My mishap grieves no one, hurts no one. Wherefore, then, should it
depress me? The world is large, and its Creator rich and good. If this
path will not succeed for me, what then? I will find out another."

In the evening she was cheerful with her family. But when night came,
and she was alone; when the external world presented no longer its
changing pictures; when loving, sweet voices no more allured her out of
herself,--then anguish and disquiet returned to her breast. In no
condition to sleep, and urged by irresistible curiosity, she sate
herself down sighingly to go through her unlucky manuscripts. She found
many pencil-marks, notes of interrogation, and traces of the thumb on
the margin, which plainly proved that the reader had gone through the
manuscript with a censorious hand, and had had satisfaction in passing
his judgment of "good for nothing!"

Ah! Petrea had built so many plans for herself and her family upon this,
which was now good for nothing; had founded upon it so many hopes for
her ascent upwards. Was nothing now to come out of them all?

Petrea read; she acknowledged the justice of many marginal remarks, but
she found, more and more, that the greater part of them had reference
to single expressions, and other trifles. Petrea read and read, and was
involuntarily captivated by that which she read. Her heart swelled, her
eyes glowed, and suddenly animated by that feeling which (we say it
_sans comparaison_) gave courage to Correggio, and which comforted
Galileo, she raised herself, and struck her hand upon the manuscript
with the exclamation, "It is good for something after all!"

Animated to the depths of her heart, she ran to Gabriele, and laughing,
embraced her with the words, "You shall see that some fine day I'll
ascend upwards yet."

PART IV.

CHAPTER I.

PETREA TO IDA.

From my Hermitage in the Garret.

"'Illusions! Illusions!' you cry over all joys, all faith, all love in
life. I shout back with all my might over your own words, 'Illusions!
Illusions!' All depends upon what we fix our faith and our affections.
Must the beauty of love and worth of life be at an end to woman when her
first spring, her bloom of love, her moments of romance are past? No, do
not believe that, Ida. Nothing in this world is such an illusion as this
belief. Life is rich; its tree b