"Look, Ernest, there is a man in love!"
Mowbray raised his head, and seeing Jacques, smiled sadly and thoughtfully; then his breast moved, and a profound sigh issued from his lips: he made no reply.
"Why!" cried Hoffland, "you have just been guilty, Ernest, of a ceremony which none but a woman should perform. What a sigh!"
Mowbray turned away his head.
"I was only thinking," he said calmly.
"Thinking of what?"
"Nothing."
"I see that you think one thing," said Hoffland, with a mischievous twinkle in his eye; "to wit, that I am very prying."
"No; but my thoughts would not interest you, Charles," said Mowbray.
And a sigh still more profound agitated his lips and breast.