“MY DEAR GEORGE, (her dear George!)—­How I wish I could be with you, to rejoice over your success!  You are really a great artist, the papers say, and are becoming famous!  Not that I love you the more for that.  If you were still unknown to the world, still only a lover of beauty for its own sake, and content with painting for your own pleasure, I am not sure that I should not love you the more.  But you will believe me, that I am proud of your success.  If I am ambitious, it is for you.  I would have the world see and know you as I do.  Yet not as I do,—­nobody can do that.  To the world you are a great painter.  To me—­ah, my dearest George!—­you are the noblest and truest heart that ever woman rested upon.  Nobody but me knows that.  I shall be proud of the homage the world gives you, because at the same time I shall say, ’That is my betrothed, my husband, whom they praise; what his heart is, no woman knows but me’”——­

He could read no farther.  His emotions were too powerful to be borne in silence.  He yielded, and, strong man as he was, bowed his head and wept.  The tears of childhood, and oftentimes the tears of woman, lie shallow; they come at the first bidding of sorrow or sympathy.  But it is no common event, no common feeling, that prevails over man; nothing less than a convulsion like an earthquake unseals the fountain of tears in him.  Whoever has seen the agony of a manly nature in groans and tears and sobs has something to remember for a life-time.

It was a long night,—­a night of unutterable suffering, struggle, and doubt.  The hours seemed shod with lead.  Sleep seemed banished from the universe.  But with the coming of dawn the tempest was stilled.  In the clear light of day the path of duty seemed plain.  He felt sure that in his heart of hearts he loved Alice, and her only.  He would go at once to Marcia and tell her of his perfidy, implore the forgiveness of silence and charity, and bid her farewell.  When he had reached this conclusion he became calm.  As he looked out from his window, he saw the world awake from slumber, and he shared in the gladness of Nature.  He even rejoiced in the prospect of deliverance from his wretched condition, although he well knew the humiliation he must pass through to attain it.  He waited impatiently for the hour when he could present himself before Marcia, own his duplicity, and take leave of her.  He felt strong in his new resolution.  All vacillation was past.  He could face any temptation without one flutter of inconstancy towards his first-love.

Greenleaf was not the only one in the city with whom the night had passed heavily.  The cloud still hung over the mercantile world.  Failures, by dozens, were announced daily.  Men heard the dismal intelligence, as in time of pestilence they would hear the report of the dead and dying.  No business-man felt secure.  No amount of property, other than ready money, was any safeguard.  Neighbor met neighbor,