gratulated him
on this happy event, and, begging he would excuse her staying with him in
the parlour, on pretence of business, withdrew, saying, she would
immediately send in a young lady who would console him for her absence.
In a few minutes he was joined by his sister, who, expecting nothing less
than to see Renaldo, no sooner distinguished his features, than she
shrieked aloud with surprise, and would have sunk upon the floor, had not
he supported her in his embrace.

Such a sudden apparition of her brother at any time, or in any place,
after their long separation, would have strongly affected this sensible
young lady; but to find him so abruptly in a place where she thought
herself buried from the knowledge of all her relations, occasioned such
commotions in her spirits as had well-nigh endangered her reason. For it
was not till after a considerable pause, that she could talk to him with
connexion or coherence. However, as those transports subsided, they
entered into a more deliberate and agreeable conversation; in the course
of which, he gradually informed her of what had passed at the castle; and
inexpressible was the pleasure she felt in learning that her mother was
released from captivity, herself restored to freedom, and her brother to
the possession of his inheritance, by the only means to which she had
always prayed these blessings might be owing.

As she had been treated with uncommon humanity by the abbess, she would
not consent to leave the convent until he should be ready to set out for
Presburg; so that they dined together with that good lady, and passed the
afternoon in that mutual communication with which a brother and sister
may be supposed to entertain themselves on such an occasion. She gave
him a detail of the insults and mortifications she had suffered from the
brutality of her father-in-law, and told him, that her confinement in
this monastery was owing to Trebasi having intercepted a letter to her
from Renaldo, signifying his intention to return to the empire, in order
to assert his own right, and redress his grievances. Then turning the
discourse upon the incidents of his peregrinations, she in a particular
manner inquired about that exquisite beauty who had been the innocent
source of all his distresses, and upon whose perfections he had often, in
his letters to his sister, expatiated with indications of rapture and
delight.

This inquiry in a moment blew up that scorching flame which h