not choose to meet me again,—and that his real 'business' was-to avoid me.

Ever your's,

CAROLINE ST. CLAIR.

CHAPTER XLV.

HOW IT HAPPENED.

In sese redit.-Virgil, Geor. IV.

THE Conjecture made by Miss St. Clair, at the conclusion of her last letter, as to the cause of Mr. Lindsay's absence was not perfectly correct. Mr. Lindsay had particular business' on the lake of Lugano, and unforeseen circumstances,' which came to his knowledge in the middle of the wood, did, in his opinion, make it necessary for him immediately to proceed there. What this particular business,' and these unforeseen circumstances' were, must appear hereafter.

The day after receiving Mr. Lindsay's note, Colonel and Mrs. Cleveland and Miss St. Clair, left the Larian Lake, sailing round the beautiful promontory of Belaggio, and down that arm of the lake which leads to Lecco, where they met their carriage, which had been sent round from Como, by land. From thence they proceeded by Bergamo,

Brescia, the Lago di Garda, (the Benacus), Verona, Vicenza, and Padua, to Venice.

But we must, for the present, leave the travellers to pursue their journey, and resume the thread of Mr. Lindsay's history, whom we left in the tower of the old castle in Ober Engadine, in the power of that mysterious being who had so lately been the means of endangering and of saving his life. What passed between them, it is not necessary at present to relate; suffice it to say that, after a sojourn in the dungeon of that ancient keep, Lindsay again issued forth to upper day, and once more, though long afterwards, made his appearance amongst the scared villagers of Sajlas; who, having unanimously come to a determination that he had been carried away by the devil, received him as one risen from the dead. The little boys and girls ran away squalling from him, the young maidens lingered with their buckets of water poised on their heads, to contemplate him from afar,--the good wife stood at her cottage door to look after him, the sober husbandman insensibly stopped his team as, with open-mouthed astonishment, he met with him,nay, even the blacksmith paused with the heavy iron uplifted in his brawny arm, as he beheld The Milord,' whose disappearance had caused such alarm in the vallies, pass suddenly by his roaring forge. But Lindsay was nearly seized upon, perforce, by his honest Engadine friends, and carried off to Berne or Geneva, for the purpose of claiming the reward which had been so liberally offered for his discovery; and he was actually obliged to pay the money himself, before he could proceed unmolested on his journey.

But even at the time of his incarceration in the tower, winter, in these Alpine vallies, which even

in July are frequently covered with snow, had begun to reign in all his terrors; and Lindsay immediately set off from Sajlas by the carriage road, then the only practicable path, which leads by Mount Maloja to Casaccio, and from thence to Chiavenna; at a short distance from which (at Riva), he embarked on the Lake of Como, where he arrived two days before the Clevelands; but having had occasion to apply to Captain Beaumont, an old friend of his who was married, and living in a villa which he had taken for the summer on the lake, he was persuaded to spend a few days with him. During his stay there, in returning from a distant mountain excursion, which had detained him late, in rowing past Cadenabbia, his attention was arrested by the sight of Caroline St. Clair pulling off the Count Landi's coat, and apparently taking somewhat extraordinary liberties with his person. She was attired in her Swiss dress, the same in which he had last seen her, in Mr. Breadalbane's bed-room, and almost in his arms; and now, in the same fascinating costume, she was apparently romping and coquetting with another man! His curiosity, indeed his jealousy, were so powerfully excited, that he could not resist stopping to see the end of this singular scene, during which the unrestrained laughter, and frolic, and intimacy that seemed to prevail in her intercourse with a perfect stranger, and the lateness of the hour-altogether gave him a painful sense of impropriety and levity.

When the Count went away to undress, and she appeared alone, at her chamber window, looking out on the beautiful moonlight scene, Lindsay could not resist gazing upon her beauty, and the heavenly expression of her countenance, with the impassioned fondness of a lover; and the internal

conviction of her virtue and innocence seemed to come home to his heart-' surely,' he mentally exclaimed, nothing but angelic purity can harbour in that sweet breast.'

If she be false-why then heaven mocks itself!

Just as the Count (for such Mrs. Cleveland seemed), stole slyly behind her, seized her in his arms, and covered her with kisses. What was Lindsay's indignant amazement, when, after a faint struggle, he beheld her fly after him, detain him, and even return his caresses! He could scarcely credit the evidence of his senses! Yet he saw it ;-even his boatmen saw it, and passed their coarse jokes upon it. It was too much. Shocked and ashamed beyond expression, he remained fixed, speechless, and lost in consternation for some moments. One exclamation burst from him, which reached Caroline's ears, as his senses regained their empire, and he instantly commanded the boatmen to row away.

As his friend, Captain Beaumont, insisted upon his accompanying him next day, to the masquerade at the villa Montini, he chose the character of Diogenes, that he might indulge the morose and unsocial temper of his soul, and like a true cynic, rail against all mankind or rather womankind,-the real objects of his present spleen.

Overflowing with ire, and, as he thought, with contempt, he watched Caroline St. Clair's arrival, that he might'speak daggers' to her. Notwithstanding her disguise of the dress of the sorcerer, the moment she spoke he recognised her voice; but the tone of that voice he found, at last, he could not hear unmoved. The innate modesty of her air and manner, the touching expression of can

dour and truth, and the perfect purity and delicacy which every word and every gesture evinced, bore down all his prejudices and determinations, overcame even the evidence of his senses, and made him feel-even while he execrated his own weakness and infatuation-that respect, admiration, and even love, still reigned at the bottom of his heart, though anger, jealousy, and contending passions raged within it. Unable to hear and see her, and command himself, he broke from her, and left the gardens.

His own voice was so effectually altered by a sort of small tube which he retained in his mouth for that purpose-án art he had learned in Spain; and his figure was so changed by the classic costume he wore, that even Miss St. Clair's penetration had not identified him.

From his friend, Captain Beaumont, who remained till the end of the fête, and was much struck with the beauty and grace of Miss St. Clair, he heard with redoubled bitterness of indignation, the undisguised attention and admiration she received the whole night from Count Montini, a man notorious for his gallantry, even among the gallant Italians, a professed libertine, a dangerous seducer -a perfect Don Juan of a man, and a married man too, though separated from his wife. Captain Beaumont, from his ignorance of the language, had, unfortunately, misunderstood Count Montini's jest, and informed Horace Lindsay, that he had boasted of Miss St. Clair's forwardness in proposing to go away with him privately, which confirmed his worst suspicions.

Two days afterwards, Horace Lindsay saw Miss St. Clair, apparently quite alone with this profligate man in the secluded groves of Belaggio; and

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