hat this heart of mine suffers, and how completely ensnared it is in
your net!"

"Cousin, cousin! you are too big a fish to fall into my net!"

"Then I swear to you that I am yours, that I have no other thought than
you, and were I put to death for it, I have been able this long time to
have no other thought than of you.... Do you know why I did not write to
you while I was in Seville?..."

"Yes; because you did not care to."

"Nothing of the sort; it was so as to see if absence would not quench
the flame that is consuming me...."

"Flames! the idea! Hush! hush! don't be absurd!"

"Laugh as much as you will; but it does not prevent it from being true,
that I have been passing through a cruel struggle, and that I have
suffered too much to write you.... 'Why?' I asked myself. 'It is vain to
have hopes, since they would be surely disappointed. Were not the
rebuffs that she gave me sufficient?' ... For, cousin, you have a
special talent for rebuffing a man; you not only give them once, but you
delight in repeating the punishment, and then trying it another day with
all the refinements of cruelty. I have set down in my note-book the
rebuffs, the saucy answers, and even the insults which you gave me in
one short fortnight.... It is a perfect marvel!... Look!... Under the
head of hard words, you have called me _old_ seven times, _audacious_
twenty-seven times, _fool_ twenty-two times, _proud_ six times, _my son_
once, _goose_ once, _a genuine Don Juan_ once, _impolite_ once: total,
sixty-six insults!... There you have it...."

"What nonsense!" exclaimed Julia, laughing heartily, and giving a slap
at the note-book which sent it to the ground.

"It is the simple truth," rejoined Don Alfonso, picking it up. "And in
spite of all that, I am stupid enough to go on loving you, or, to
express myself better, to love you more and more every day, as is proved
by my visit to Santander. Since I left you, Julia, I have not had a
moment's peace; and though I have tried every possible way of
distracting my thoughts so as to forget you, still ever your graceful
form would come before my eyes. In Madrid I suffered much, because I was
always kept hovering between fear, hope, and despair; but in Seville,
far from you, I missed those sufferings, and it seemed to me that the
pleasure of seeing you, of hearing your voice, and living under the same
roof were a sufficient compensation for them, and even an advantage....
I don't know what has