“I know not how to express,” said Etienne, addressing his companion, “the sensations that light, cast upon the water, excites in me.  I have often watched it streaming from the windows of that room,” he added, pointing back to his mother’s chamber, “until it was extinguished.”

“Delicate as Gabrielle is,” said Beauvouloir, gaily, “she can come and walk with us; the night is warm, and the air has no dampness.  I will fetch her; but be prudent, monseigneur.”

Etienne was too timid to propose to accompany Beauvouloir into the house; besides, he was in that torpid state into which we are plunged by the influx of ideas and sensations which give birth to the dawn of passion.  Conscious of more freedom in being alone, he cried out, looking at the sea now gleaming in the moonlight,—­

“The Ocean has passed into my soul!”

The sight of the lovely living statuette which was now advancing towards him, silvered by the moon and wrapped in its light, redoubled the palpitations of his heart, but without causing him to suffer.

“My child,” said Beauvouloir, “this is monseigneur.”

In a moment poor Etienne longed for his father’s colossal figure; he would fain have seemed strong, not puny.  All the vanities of love and manhood came into his heart like so many arrows, and he remained in gloomy silence, measuring for the first time the extent of his imperfections.  Embarrassed by the salutation of the young girl, he returned it awkwardly, and stayed beside Beauvouloir, with whom he talked as they paced along the shore; presently, however, Gabrielle’s timid and deprecating countenance emboldened him, and he dared to address her.  The incident of the song was the result of mere chance.  Beauvouloir had intentionally made no preparations; he thought, wisely, that between two beings in whom solitude had left pure hearts, love would arise in all its simplicity.  The repetition of the air by Gabrielle was a ready text on which to begin a conversation.

During this promenade Etienne was conscious of that bodily buoyancy which all men have felt at the moment when a first love transports their vital principle into another being.  He offered to teach Gabrielle to sing.  The poor lad was so glad to show himself to this young girl invested with some slight superiority that he trembled with pleasure when she accepted his offer.  At that moment the moonlight fell full upon her, and enabled Etienne to note the points of her resemblance to his mother, the late duchess.  Like Jeanne de Saint-Savin, Beauvouloir’s daughter was slender and delicate; in her, as in the duchess, sadness and suffering conveyed a mysterious charm.  She had that nobility of manner peculiar to souls on whom the ways of the world have had no influence, and in whom all is noble because all is natural.  But in Gabrielle’s veins there was also the blood of “la belle Romaine,” which had flowed there from two generations, giving to this young girl