destruction!"“Your boldness confounds me! Shall _I_ conceal your crime, _I_ whom you have deceived by your feigned confession? No, Daughter, no! I will render you a more essential service. I will rescue you from perdition in spite of yourself; Penance and mortification shall expiate your offence, and Severity force you back to the paths of holiness. What; Ho! Mother St. Agatha!”

“Father! By all that is sacred, by all that is most dear to you, I supplicate, I entreat....”

“Release me! I will not hear you. Where is the Domina? Mother St. Agatha, where are you?”

The door of the Vestry opened, and the Prioress entered the Chapel, followed by her Nuns.

“Cruel! Cruel!” exclaimed Agnes, relinquishing her hold. Wild and desperate, She threw herself upon the ground, beating her bosom and rending her veil in all the delirium of despair. The Nuns gazed with astonishment upon the scene before them. The Friar now presented the fatal paper to the Prioress, informed her of the manner in which he had found it, and added, that it was her business to decide, what penance the delinquent merited. 

While She perused the letter, the Domina’s countenance grew inflamed with passion. What! Such a crime committed in her Convent, and made known to Ambrosio, to the Idol of Madrid, to the Man whom She was most anxious to impress with the opinion of the strictness and regularity of her House! Words were inadequate to express her fury. She was silent, and darted upon the prostrate Nun looks of menace and malignity.

“Away with her to the Convent!” said She at length to some of her Attendants. Two of the oldest Nuns now approaching Agnes, raised her forcibly from the ground, and prepared to conduct her from the Chapel.

“What!” She exclaimed suddenly shaking off their hold with distracted gestures; “Is all hope then lost? Already do you drag me to punishment? Where are you, Raymond? Oh! save me! save me!” Then casting upon the Abbot a frantic look, “Hear me!” She continued; “Man of an hard heart! Hear me, Proud, Stern, and Cruel! You could have saved me; you could have restored me to happiness and virtue, but would not! You are the destroyer of my Soul; You are my Murderer, and on you fall the curse of my death and my unborn Infant’s! Insolent in your yet-unshaken virtue, you disdained the prayers of a Penitent; But God will show mercy, though you show none. And where is the merit of your boasted virtue? What temptations have you vanquished? Coward! you have fled 

 Prev. P 30/312 next