'You will not speak to me!' cried he; 'you will not trust me! shall I call you cruel? No! for you are not aware of the pain you inflict, the anguish you make me suffer! the generosity of your nature would else, unbidden, impulsively interfere.'

'You suffer! you!' cried she, again distressfully, almost incredulously, looking at him, while her hands were uplifted with amazement: 'I thought you above any suffering! superior to all calamity!... almost to all feeling!...'

'Ah, Camilla! what thus estranges you from candor? from justice? what is it can prompt you to goad thus a heart which almost from its first beating....'

He stopt, desirous to check himself; while penetrated by his softness, and ashamed of what, in the bitterness of her spirit, she had pronounced, she again melted into tears, and sunk down upon the bench; yet holding out to him one hand, while with the other she covered her face: 'Forgive me,' she cried, 'I entreat ... for I scarce know what I say.'

Such a speech, and so accompanied, might have demolished the stoicism of an older philosopher than Edgar; he fervently kissed her proferred hand, exclaiming: 'Forgive you! can Camilla use such a word? has she the slightest care for my opinion? the most remote concern for me, or for my happiness?'

'Farewell! farewell!' cried she, hastily drawing away her hand, 'go now, I beseech you!'

'What a moment to expect me to depart! O Camilla! my soul sickens of this suspence! End it, generous Camilla! beloved as lovely! my heart is all your own! use it gently, and accept it nobly!'

Every other emotion, now, in the vanquished Camilla, every retrospective fear, every actual regret, yielded to the conquering charm of grateful tenderness; and restoring the hand she had withdrawn: 'O Edgar,' she cried, 'how little can I merit such a gift! yet I prize it ... far, far beyond all words!'

The agitation of Edgar was, at first, too mighty and too delicious for speech; but his eyes, now cast up to heaven, now fixed upon her own, spoke the most ardent, yet purest felicity; while her hand, now held to his heart, now pressed to his lips, strove vainly to recover its liberty. 'Blest moment!' he at length uttered, 'that finishes for every such misery of uncertainty! that gives my life to happiness ... my existence to Camilla!'

Again speech seemed too poor for him. Perfect satisfaction is seldom loquacious; its character is rather tender than gay; and where happiness succeeds abruptly to long solicitude and sorrow, its enjoyment is fearful; it softens rather than exhilarates. Sudden joy is sportive, but sudden happiness is awful.