de la Tour, "which, for a long time, involved his nearest friends in deep affliction.

He did not long survive your mother, and his family would gladly have received you into their protection, had not your aunt Rossville claimed you as her sister's last bequest.

She soon after became a protestant, and persisted in educating you in that faith, which naturally gave offence to your paternal relatives; and to that cause alone I attribute the decline of their interest.

But, if you return to France, and as the wife of De Valette,"-- "That I can never do!" interrupted Lucie;--"dearest aunt," she added, "I would sacrifice much to gratify your wishes; but the happiness of my whole life,--surely you would not exact that from me!" "I exact nothing from you, Lucie," she replied; "but I would have you consider well, before you finally reject the tried affection of De Valette, and with it affluence and an honorable station in your native land, merely from the impulse of a girlish fancy, which would rashly lead you from friends and country, to share the doubtful fortunes of a puritan; to adopt the habits of strangers, and endure the privations of a youthful colony!" "I have reflected on all these things," said Lucie; "and I am persuaded that wealth and distinction are, at best, but empty substitutes for happiness; and that the humblest lot is rich in true enjoyment, when shared with one whose love is the fountain of our hopes, whose smile can brighten the darkest hour, and scatter roses over the thorniest path of life.

I had rather," she added, with a glowing cheek, "far rather trust my little bark to the guidance of affection, upon the placid stream of domestic joy, than to launch it on the troubled waters of ambition, with pleasure at the helm, and freighted with hopes and desires, which can bring back no returns but those of disappointment and vexation." "This is a dream of idle romance, which can never bear the test of reality," said Mad.