cases where the latter may have had a strong hold upon the affections of such a noble nature.  Nay, the very fact of finding that one’s affections have been fixed upon a person capable of such dishonor, produces a double portion of indignation at the discovery of their profligacy, because it supposes, in the first place, that something like imposture must have been practised upon us in securing our affections, or what is still more degrading, that we must have been materially devoid of common penetration, or we could not have suffered ourselves to become the dupe of craft and dissimulation.

Our high-minded heroine, however, had no other theory upon the subject of her own feelings, than that she loved her religion and its precepts, and detested every word that was at variance with truth, and every act inconsistent with honesty and that faithful integrity which resists temptation and corruption in whatever plausible shapes they may approach it.

Be this, however, as it may, she now found that, as time advanced, her heart began to fall into its original habits.  The tumult occasioned by the shock resulting from her lover’s want of integrity, had now nearly passed away, and the affection of the woman began to supersede the severity of the judge.  By degrees she was enabled, as we have said, to look back upon her conduct, and to judge, of her lover through the more softened medium of her reviving affection.  This feeling gained upon her slowly but surely, until her conscience became, alarmed at the excess of her own severity towards him.  Still, however, she would occasionally return, as it were, to a contemplation of his delinquency, and endeavor, from an unconscious principle of self-love, to work herself up into that lofty hatred of dishonor which had prompted his condemnation; but the effort was in vain.  Every successive review of his guilt was attended by a consciousness that she had been righteous overmuch, and that the consequences of his treason, even against their common religion, were not only rapidly diminishing in her heart, but yielding to something that very nearly resembled remorse.

Such was the state of her feelings on the day when Kate Hogan and her male relatives indulged in the friendly and affectionate dialogue we have just detailed.  Her heart was smitten, in fact, with sorrow for the harsh part she had taken against her lover, and she only waited for an opportunity to pour out a full confession of all she felt into the friendly ear of her sister.

Gerald Cavanagh’s family at this period was darkened by a general spirit of depression and gloom.  Their brother James, from whatever cause it may have proceeded, seemed to be nearly as much cast down as his sister; and were it not that Cavanagh himself and his wife sustained themselves by a hope that Kathleen might ultimately relax so far as to admit, as she had partly promised to do, the proposals of Edward Burke, it would have been difficult to find so much suffering apart from death under the same roof.