valier in great emotion, while delight's warm beam illumined his countenance; "6 my sweet friend, this is too much; it is 66 even more than I meant to exact from you; I did not indeed for a moment be"lieve de Sancy had touched your heart, "for, Oh, Imogen, I fear I feel-the "great, the profound emotions of which "that tender sensible heart is capable lie "yet torpid and unawakened. But to your "active and ardent disposition some ob"ject of interest is indispensably requi"site; and he who failed in vanquishing

your heart has captivated your imagi "nation. Oh! Imogen, you are not "formed for the world in which you live; "and even in the midst of all the plea"surable, but empty enjoyments it can "bestow, you are all, all the slave of "" your imagination :-you are bewildered, "but you are not satisfied; you are in"toxicated, but you are not happy."With these words, and obviously agitated,

the chevalier kissed the hand he held, and hastily retired.

"I am not happy," repeated Imogen to herself; "I am not indeed happy :" and she burst into tears. "Oh! de

Sorville, how cruel is the effect of "that solicitude which urges you to "tear the veil from the heart whose feel "ings and whose wants I would hide. "from myself; to awaken me from that "dream of peace in which I blindly re"velled, and touch upon that bosom"chord where all my joys and all my "sorrows hang." It was now for the first time since Imogen had plunged into the rosy tide of pleasure, or floated in soft delirium on its traiterous wave, that reflection dissipated the fairy spell with which she had cheated herself into seeming bliss, and taught her to understand the nature of those feelings which often hung a gloomy shade upon the brilliant gloss of joy, and dimmed with a tear the frolic

1

smile which the triumph of every long cherished wish illumined in her eye.

Why, when the adulation of a world was offered up at the shrine of her genius and her charms, did her unsatisfied soul so often turn on itself in anxious search for something dearer to its feelings than the world's adulation could bestow? why, even in the moment of pleasurable delirium, did her sated senses sicken in the midst of their gay enjoyment? or why, when gallantry wooed her delighted attention with all the persuasive rhetoric of assumed passion, did her ear refuse to convey its homage to her heart, and her lip exhale the sigh of pensive and abstracted reflection?→→ "It is," said Imogen, "because every

thing dissipates, and nothing touches me; because my heart is all a void, a frightful void, and my affections, chilled "and withered, in vain seek an object to "kindle their warmth and awaken their

energy. And what is praise, unheard

by one in whose triumph only we can truly triumph and what is pleasure, "if the heart participates not in its illu❝sions ?"

Often indeed, after the gay and dissipated orgies of the day, had Imogen sought her couch without being pursued thither by one felicitous recollection rescued from the multitude of enjoyments which had pressed their treasures on her acceptance; and it was then that the faded vision of her soul-felt bliss floated o'er awaking memory, and that the now passive heart stole from the recollection of its former felicity one sweet emotion to warm its latent nerves:-for the rich, the noble, the farfamed lady de St. Dorval remembered on ber purple couch of down the golden dream that once hovered over the bumble pillow of the novice of St. Dominick; that dream which was but the reflected vision of her waking joys; that dream which gave back to her imagination the inter

course of soul she had recently supported with the minstrel of Provence. Her heart kindled at the endearing remembrancebut despondency chilled the transient glow, and many a tear stained that cheek which the ensuing day bebeld dimpled with the sportive smile of pleasure: for, denied that supreme happiness of which her soul was capable, she pursued the attainment of all those lesser joys fortune had placed within her grasp, and pursued them with all that unmodified ardour which marked the enthusiasm of her character, and the vivacity of her disposition.

The last day of her first five weeks' residence at Paris, was that on which Imogen had completed her twentieth year, and, according to her father's will, was of age, On this day a splendid entertainment was to be held at the hotel de St. Dorval; and a short time previous to the assembling of her guests, the chevalier requested and obtained a private audience of Imogen in