tending to his companion—"how bitterly she reproaches herself! and to think that this earnest, this sorrowful love, has been a toy—an amusement—the result of such heartless treachery! I never can tell her—but I ought—I must!"
"Why, it is the very thing that I am advising you to do," cried Lavinia: "the game is in your own hands!"
"How little," said he, still rather thinking aloud, than talking, "did I think, while writing these letters, proud of their composition, what misery I was inflicting on another, and storing up for myself!"
"And little did I think," muttered Lavinia, " that I could have been so mistaken. I have always fancied that it was Miss Churchill who inspired you with all these fine verses; instead of that, it was Lady Marchmont!"
And a bitter jealousy took possession of her mind. She had grown accustomed to look upon Ethel as Walter's passion and inspiration: it was something far off and distant,
