s of Leicester gave unusual emotion to his voice and
manner.

Leicester was overpowered by his assumed superiority it seemed to the
unfortunate Earl as if his last friend was about to abandon him. He
stretched his hand towards Varney as he uttered the words, "Do not leave
me. What wouldst thou have me do?"

"Be thyself, my noble master," said Varney, touching the Earl's hand
with his lips, after having respectfully grasped it in his own; "be
yourself, superior to those storms of passion which wreck inferior
minds. Are you the first who has been cozened in love--the first whom a
vain and licentious woman has cheated into an affection, which she
has afterwards scorned and misused? And will you suffer yourself to be
driven frantic because you have not been wiser than the wisest men whom
the world has seen? Let her be as if she had not been--let her pass from
your memory, as unworthy of ever having held a place there. Let your
strong resolve of this morning, which I have both courage, zeal,
and means enough to execute, be like the fiat of a superior being, a
passionless act of justice. She hath deserved death--let her die!"

While he was speaking, the Earl held his hand fast, compressed his lips
hard, and frowned, as if he laboured to catch from Varney a portion of
the cold, ruthless, and dispassionate firmness which he recommended.
When he was silent, the Earl still continued to rasp his hand, until,
with an effort at calm decision, he was able to articulate, "Be it
so--she dies! But one tear might be permitted."

"Not one, my lord," interrupted Varney, who saw by the quivering eye and
convulsed cheek of his patron that he was about to give way to a burst
of emotion--"not a tear--the time permits it not. Tressilian must be
thought of--"

"That indeed is a name," said the Earl, "to convert tears into blood.
Varney, I have thought on this, and I have determined--neither entreaty
nor argument shall move me--Tressilian shall be my own victim."

"It is madness, my lord; but you are too mighty for me to bar your
way to your revenge. Yet resolve at least to choose fitting time and
opportunity, and to forbear him until these shall be found."

"Thou shalt order me in what thou wilt," said Leicester, "only thwart me
not in this."

"Then, my lord," said Varney, "I first request of you to lay aside the
wild, suspected, and half-frenzied demeanour which hath this day drawn
the eyes of all the court upon you, and which, but for