consideration for Miss St. Clair. If you choose wilfully to swallow draughts of poison yourself— merely because they taste sweet-at least do not administer them to her. Bystanders see more of the game than the performers, and I warn you that you may injure her peace. Lovely and interesting, and sensible, as I am willing to allow she is in an uncommon degree-you will infallibly, unsuspected by her or yourself, steal into her heart, exclude every other competitor, destroy all the prospects of her youth, and embitter her future life. Such are your powers of insinuation, and so impossible is it for you, towards her, not to exert them—that if she had not been possessed of very singular self-command, and proper selfestimation, she could not possibly have escaped you. As it is, she may thank herself for it— She is no common character-and when she forms an attachment, I suspect it will be for life. Remember-her happiness is in your power. If you love her, avoid her.

not you.

I say nothing of the justice due to Miss Hamilton, because with all your fine sentiments of honour and generosity, you seem wholly forgetful of what you owe to her. Neither shall I attempt to point out how admirably your fine sounding determination

to make her happy-however miserable you may be yourself-accords with devoting yourself, meanwhile, entirely to another woman. To urge such considerations, would be to suppose you still had some remaining glimmerings of common sense, of which it is impossible to suspect you. By the way, did you know that Miss Hamilton is here with her father? She is universally admired and respected. You say truly she is too good for you do not estimate her as she deserves, nor love her as you ought.

you;

My father is lingering in a very melancholy state-still retaining possession of his mind and faculties, but perfectly helpless and deprived of the use of his limbs. No hope of any favourable change-and no reason to apprehend any immediate alteration for the worse.

Your's truly,

Cheltenham, 3d August, 1816.

J. H.

FROM THE

LETTER XXXV.

HONOURABLE HORACE LINDSAY, TO

JOHN HEATHCOTE, ESQ.

Geneva, August 10th, 1816.

Yes my friend, you are right. You have torn the veil of self-delusion from my sight-and I see and feel the fatal truth. My fate is sealed, and misery is my portion. But at least I will bear it alone. At least I will never have to reproach myself with voluntarily planting in the bosom of the woman I adore, the consuming canker-worm that preys upon my own heart. Nor will I forget what I owe to her to whom I have promised to devote my life.

I go to bury myself in the deepest recesses of the Alps-to wander alone amidst the desolation of nature, and seek those scenes of solitude and sublimity, which best assimilate with the feelings of my soul. Time, I know, will soften their intensity. The storms of passion, like those of nature, must exhaust themselves by their own violence. The dead, still, gloomy calm which succeeds the bursting

of the tempest, will eventually be mine. prospect for the dreary length of life!

What a

Heathcote! if I am a fool, at least you see I am aware of it. If I am mad, there is method in my madness. Some glimmering of reason yet remains to shew me my own true state—and I can judge of it like the calm spectator-not like the wretch writhing under its sufferings.

Incessant violent bodily exertion is my sole

resource.

In encountering toil and hardships— in surmounting difficulties and perils-I find the only alleviation of my wretchedness.

Rest and

ease are torture.

Your's ever,

H. L.

CHAPTER XXXIII.

LOVE'S LABOUR LOST.

Vouloir oublier quelqu'une, c'est y penser.

LA BRUYERE.

I leave myself, my friends, and all for love.

SHAKSPEARE.

Now I know what it is to have strove,
With the tortures of love and desire;
What it is to admire and to love,

And to leave her we love and admire.

SHENSTONE.

SOME men, under the pressure of violent mental suffering, sink into apathetic despondency and inertion-some fly to the haunts of men and the scenes of dissipation-and some seek the depths of solitude, and the wild excitement of perilous enterprise, as if to blunt, by the constant sense of fatigue and hardship, and the sufferings of the corporeal frame, the anguish of the soul.