e of the traitor and the
braggart with the contempt and disgust he merited. Some friend of
Kerguelen's heard what had passed, and deemed it his duty to inform
him. The most unhappy husband called the seducer to the field, wounded
him mortally, and--to increase yet more his infamy--even in the agony
of death the slave confessed the whole, and craved forgiveness like a
dog. Confessed the _woman's crime_--you mark me, Raoul!--had he died
mute, or died even with a falsehood in his mouth, as I think he was
bound to do in such extremity, affirming her innocence with his last
breath, he had saved her, and perhaps spared her wretched lord the
misery of knowing certainly the depth of his dishonor."

The boy pondered for a moment or two without making any answer; and
although he was evidently not altogether satisfied, probably would not
have again spoken, had not his father, who read what was passing in
his mind, asked him what it was that he desired to know further.

Raoul smiled at perceiving how completely his father understood him,
and then said at once, without pause or hesitation--

"I understand you to say, sir, that you thought the wretched man of
whom we spoke was bound, under the extremity in which he stood, to die
with a falsehood in his mouth. Can a gentleman ever be justified in
saying the thing that is not? Much more can it be his bounden duty to
do so?"

"Unquestionably, as a rule of general conduct, he cannot. Truth is the
soul of honor; and without truth, honor cannot exist. But this is a
most intricate and tangled question. It never can arise without
presupposing the commission of one guilty act--one act which no good
or truly moral man would commit at all. It is, therefore, scarcely
worth our while to examine it. But I do say, on my deliberate and
grave opinion, that if a woman, previously innocent and pure, have
sacrificed her honor to a man, that man is bound to sacrifice every
thing, his life without a question, and I think his truth also, in
order to preserve her character, so far as he can, scathless. But we
will speak no more of this. It is an odious subject, and one of which,
I trust, you, Raoul, will never have the sad occasion to consider."

"Oh! never, father, never! I," cried the ingenuous boy, "I must first
lose my senses, and become a madman."

"All men are madmen, Raoul," said the church-man, who stood in the
relation of maternal uncle to the youth, "who suffer their passions to
have the ma