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"If I may be permitted to give my opinion, my dear father, without being guilty of presumption, I think that notwithstanding his crimes, as he is the uncle of my mother and brother of my grandfather;-out of respect to their memory, we should if possible oblige him to acknowledge me, without making the affair public. This method, I am of opinion, would be preferable, because it is impossible for him to deny the fact, from having so many witnesses against him, that it will be of little avail; and at all events if he persists in falshood, it will then be time enough to bring him to justice; though I own I should prefer his being left to the stings of his own conscience, which must sufficiently avenge the crimes he has committed; more particularly as the daughter of her he had contributed to destroy, and had likewise been the innocent object of his persecution, now triumphs over him, although he had practised the most wicked designs against her, and even attempted her

life. His malignity," Amelrosa continued, while a modest blush tinged her cheek, “I know my dear father would not repay with the same conduct, for you do not even hate those who use you ill; but have often behaved with kindness to people that have unjustly treated you."

Her benevolent interposition in favor of her bitterest enemy, pleased Lord Rossmore, and he flattered her by saying he approved what she had advanced and should observe it." However," rejoined his lordship," though I have almost constantly forgiven any injuries done to myself and effaced them from my recollection, for vengeance and rancour do not inhabit my breast, yet I confess I have felt a strong inclination to resent and avenge the wrongs done to those I loved better than my own life; however, I shall certainly now forego the propensity I felt."

CHAP.

CHAP. X.

Me miserable! which way shall I fly
Infinite wrath and infinite despair?
Which way I fly is hell; myself an hell;
And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep
Still threat'ning to devour me opens wide,
To which the hell I suffer seems a heaven.

Milton.

ATTENDED by a reverend priest, Jacome and several other persons, to guard him from treachery, Lord Rossmore set off the next morning for Souza, where Don Luis de Zamara resided. They found every thing in confusion at his habitation. Zamara being confined to his bed with a wound which it was apprehended would prove mortal. Not waiting then to learn. the occasion, but conjecturing that it was in some base fray he had received it, and fearful

fearful he might not live to do an act of justice to Amelrosa; they hastened to his chamber, where extended on a bed lay the wretched and guilty Zamara. How changed since his lordship had seen him in the prime of life, handsome, animated and haughty. His eyes were sunk and dim, his yellow visage, long, thin, and wrinkled, but though altered in such a degree, that Lord Rossmore, had he seen him any where else would not have remembered him, Zamara knew him directly, and a guilty horror and dismay was diffused over his livid countenance; for his lordship, though considerably older than when he last saw him, and reduced by grief, looked still noble, handsome and interesting.

Virtuous sorrow had altered Lord Rossmore, but it was vice, debauchery, and crimes of the blackest die, that had thus changed the miserable Zamara. Conscious of his various enormities unexpectedly brought to light, the bed shook beneath

him, with the agitation and tremor that seized his guilty frame at the discovery of his villany, when his lordship mentioned the purpose for which he came. The sight of Jacome, caused him the most violent agitation; a gleam of fury lightened up his haggard eye, and he seemed as if he could, had he dared, have sprung from the bed, feeble as he was, to have stabbed him. He gnashed his teeth, groaned loudly, and muttered out incoherent words, nor could he be prevailed on to give a clear and proper answer, till the letter Padilla delivered to Signora Valeria was produced, and then finding it useless to deny his crimes, as all was known, and the priest exhorted him to make the only atonement in his power by avowing the truth; he at length confessed with hesitation, that Amelrosa was indeed the daughter of Lord Rossmore and Elmira his niece.

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Zamara then briefly related his scheme in concert with Mrs. Marley, that caused

Don

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