him; but the future was still hidden from his eyes, and death was omnipotent.  His power of working evil had no bounds, but his power of good was limited; and yet it was good that he desired.  How dared he put in motion those mighty changes, which seemed to promise such happiness on earth, while he was ignorant of what their results might be? and of what avail was the joy he might pour out on life, over whose next hour the grave might close, and only make the parting breath more bitter from the blessings which it was leaving behind?”

I was no unworthy daughter of such a sire; I advanced in these divine studies even to his wish, and looked to the future with a hope which many years had deadened in himself, but from which I caught an omen of ultimate success.  Alas! he mastered not his destiny:  I have said before, his ashes are in yonder urn.  A few unwholesome dews on a summer night were mightier than all his science.  For a time I struggled not with despair; but youth is buoyant, and habit is strong.  Again I pored over the mystic scroll—­again I called on the spirits with spell and with sign.  Many a mystery was revealed, many a wonder grew familiar; but still death remained at the end of all things, as before.  One night I was on the terrace of my tower.  Above me was the deep, blue sky, with its stars—­worlds filled, perchance, with the intelligence which I sought.  On the desert below was the phantasm of a great city.  I looked on its small and miserable streets, where hunger and cold reigned paramount, and man was as wretched as if flung but yesterday on the earth, and there had been as yet no time for art to yield its assistance, or labour to bring forth its fruit.  I gazed next on scenes of festivity, but they were not glad; for I looked from the wreath into the head it encircled, and from the carcanet of gems to the heart which beat beneath—­and I saw envy, and hate, and repining, and remorse.  I turned my last glance on the palace within its walls; but there the purple was spread as a pall, and the voice of sorrow and the cry of pain were loud on the air.  I bade the shadows roll away upon the winds, and rose depressed and in sorrow.  I was not alone:  one of those glorious spirits, whose sphere was far beyond the power of our science, whose existence we rather surmised than knew; stood beside me.

From that hour a new existence opened before me.  I loved, and I was beloved—­love, to which imagination gave poetry, and mind gave strength, was the new element added to my being.  Alas! how little do the miserable race to which I belong know of such a feeling.  They blend a moment’s vanity, a moment’s gratification, into a temporary excitement, and they call it love.  Such are the many, and the many make the wretchedness of earth.  And yet your own heart, Leoni, and that of my gentle cousin, may witness for my words, there are such things as truth, and tenderness, and devotion in the world; and such redeem the darkness and degradation of its lot.  Nay, more, if ever the mystery of our destiny be unravelled, and happiness be wrought out of wisdom, it will be the work of love.