“‘Cecil Grahame!’ I exclaimed, in a tone that rung in my ears some hours afterwards, and I believe made him start, daring even as he was, ’do you know it is your mother of whom you speak? a mother whose only fault towards you was too much love, a mother whose too fond heart your cruel conduct broke; are you so completely devoid of feeling that not even this can move you?’

“’Pray add to your long list of my good mother’s perfections a weakness that ruined me, that made me the wretch I am,’ he wildly exclaimed, and he clenched his hand and bit his lip till the blood came, while his cheek became livid with some feeling I could not fathom.  He spurred his horse violently, the spirited animal started forward, a kind of spell seemed to rivet my eyes upon him.  There was a loud report of cannon from the Place de Greve, several balls whizzed close by me, evidently fired to disperse the multitude, who were tumultuously assembling on the Pont de la Cite, and ere I could recover from the startling effects of the report, I heard a shrill scream of mortal agony, and Cecil Grahame fell from his horse a shattered corpse.

* * * * *

For several minutes I was wholly unconscious of all that was passing around me.  I stood by the body of the unfortunate young man, quite insensible to the danger I was incurring from the shot.  I could only see him before my eyes, as I had known him in his boyhood and his earliest youth, full of fair promises, of hopeful futurity, the darling of his mother’s eye, the pride of his father, spite of his faults; and now what was he? a mangled corpse, cut off without warning or preparation in his early youth.  But, oh, worse, far worse than all, with the words of hatred, of defiance on his lips.  I sought in vain for life; there was no sign, no hope.  To attempt to rescue the body was vain, the tumult was increasing fearfully around me; many gendarmes were falling indiscriminately with the populace, and the countenance of Cecil was so fearfully disfigured, that to attempt to recognise it when all might again be quiet would, I knew, be useless.  One effort I made, I inquired for and sought Lord Alphingham’s hotel, intending to obtain his assistance in the proper interment of this unfortunate young man, but in this was equally frustrated; the hotel was closely shut up.  Lord and Lady Alphingham had, at the earliest threatening of disturbances, retreated to their chateau in the province of Champagne.  I forwarded the melancholy intelligence to them, and returned to my own hotel sick at heart with the sight I had witnessed.  The fearful tone of his last words, the agonized shriek, rung in my ears, as the shattered form and face floated before my eyes, with a tenacity no effort of my own or even of my Louisa’s could dispel.  Oh, my mother, what do I not owe you for guarding me from the temptations that have assailed this wretched young man, or rather for imprinting on my infant mind those principles which, with the