Is it not an insult to me, for you to express anxiety as to the future of our child! Oh heaven! she loves me, she knows me, and yet she doubts!' "I skip," said Noel, "two pages of passionate rhapsody, and stop at these few lines at the end.

'The countess's condition causes her to suffer very much! Unfortunate wife! I hate and at the same time pity her.

She seems to divine the reason of my sadness and my coldness.

By her timid submission and unalterable sweetness, one would think she sought pardon for our unhappy union.

Poor sacrificed creature! She also may have given her heart to another, before being dragged to the altar.
Our fates would then be the same.