THE VICTIM OF MAGICAL DELUSION.
OR, INTERESTING MEMOIRS OF MIGUEL, DUKE DE CA*I*A.
UNFOLDING MANY CURIOUS UNKNOWN HISTORICAL FACTS.
Translated from the German of Tschink.
(Continued from [page 70].)
She stopped in the second street at a large palace, telling me that we were on the spot. I ordered the servant to tell his lady, the Marchese Albertini would be glad to wait on her Ladyship, and was admitted. I hastened through the first apartment with a panting heart, and the second door being opened, was very kindly received by an old lady. I was almost petrified by that unexpected sight, like a poor disappointed wretch who, deceived by magic art, expects to rush into the arms of an immortal beauty, suddenly embraces an old toothless beldam. The lady seemed to be equally surprised. I did not know whether it was on account of my person or my astonishment—and I begged her pardon, in a faultering accent, for having committed that mistake, telling her that I had taken the liberty to intrude upon her, in hopes of seeing the Countess de Clairval, when——the door of a third apartment was opened, and a lady beautiful as an angel, dressed in white satin, and of a majestic form, made her appearance. I flew to meet her---and pressed Amelia’s hand to my glowing lips.
Her lovely cheeks were covered with a crimson hue, and after a short interval of silent astonishment, she exclaimed: “Is it possible, my Lord! How does it happen that we have the honour of seeing you here?”
“I don’t know it myself!” I exclaimed, “my life is an uninterrupted train of wonders, and it was certainly one of the most fortunate that brought me to your Ladyship!”
“You find me in the company of a friend,” Amelia said, introducing me to the old lady, “whom I had lost in my earlier youth, but found again four months ago through a most singular accident, which however I think to be one of the most fortunate of my life. You will recollect that when I related to you the history of my youth, I mentioned a white lady who appeared to me in the dusk of evening, in a grotto in my father’s garden, and who had directed and cheered me in my juvenile years like a heavenly being---”
“And that white lady---”
“Is the Baroness de Delier, who is now standing before you.”