'O, far from it, far, far, I hope!' said Lady Aurora: 'if I thought that we should meet no more, it would be impossible for me to tell you how unhappy this moment would make me!'

'Where is Lady Aurora?' would again have hurried her away; but Ellis, still holding by her, cried, 'One moment! one moment!—I have not, then, lost your good opinion? Oh! if that wavers, my firmness wavers too! and I must unfold—at all risks—my unhappy situation!'

'Not for the world! not for the world!' cried Lady Aurora, earnestly: 'I could not bear to seem to have any doubt to remove, when I have none, none, of your perfect innocence, goodness, excellence!'

Overpowered with grateful joy, 'Angelic Lady Aurora!' was all that Ellis could utter, while tears rolled fast down her cheeks; and she tenderly, yet fervently, kissed the hand of the resisting Lady Aurora, who, extremely affected, leant upon her bosom, till she was startled by again hearing her name from without. 'Go, then, amiable Lady Aurora!' Ellis cried; 'I will no longer detain you! Go!—happy in the happiness that your sweetness, your humanity, your kindness bestow! I will dwell continually, upon their recollection; I will say to myself, Lady Aurora believes me innocent, though she sees me forlorn; she will not think me unworthy, though she knows me to be unprotected; she will not conclude me to be an adventurer, though I dare not tell her even my name!'

'Do not talk thus, my dear, dear Miss Ellis! Oh! if I were my own mistress—with what delight I should supplicate you to live with me entirely! to let us share between us all that we possess; to read together, study our musick together, and never, never to part!'

Ellis could hardly breathe: her soul seemed bursting with emotions, which, though the most delicious, were nearly too mighty for her frame. But the melting kindness of Lady Aurora soon soothed her into more tranquil enjoyment; and when, at length, a message from Mrs Howel irresistibly compelled a separation, the warm gratitude of her heart, for the consolation which she had received, enabled her to endure it with fortitude. But not without grief. All seemed gone when Lady Aurora was driven from the door; and she remained weeping at the window, whence she saw her depart, till she was roused by the entrance of Mrs Greaves, the housekeeper.

Her familiar intrusion, without tapping at the door, quickly brought to the recollection of Ellis the authority which had been vested in her hands. This immediately restored her spirit; and as the housekeeper, seating herself, was beginning, very unceremoniously, to explain the motives of her visit, Ellis, without looking at her, calmly said, 'I shall go down stairs now to breakfast; but if you have time to be so good as to make up my packages, you will find them in those drawers.'

She then descended to the parlour, leaving the housekeeper stupified with amazement. But the forms of subordination, when once broken down, are rarely, with common characters, restored. Glad of the removal of a barrier which has kept them at a distance from those above them, they revel in the idea that the fall of a superiour is their own proper elevation. Following, therefore, Ellis to the breakfast-room, and seating herself upon a sofa, she began to discourse with the freedom of addressing a disgraced dependent; saying, 'Mrs Maple will be in a fine taking, Miss, to have you upon her hands, again, so all of the sudden.'

This speech, notwithstanding its grossness, surprised from Ellis an exclamation, 'Does not Mrs Maple, then, expect me?'

'How should she, when my lady never settled what she should do about you herself, till after twelve o'clock last night? However, as to sending you back without notice, she had no notion, she says, of standing upon any ceremony with Mrs Maple, who made so little of popping you upon her and Lady Aurora in that manner.'