Page:Clermont - Roche (1798, volume 4).djvu/66

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ful recollections might not be awakened? what horrible fears might not be suggested?


"Oh, God! (cried she, kneeling upon the ground, half distracted with her incertitude how to act), teach me what I ought to do! Oh, let me not, in trying to avoid misery myself, draw misery upon him for whom I would willingly lay down my life."


The night passed away in a state of wretchedness which cannot be described, and the morning surprised her still undetermined. The bustle of the rising domestics at length made her recall her scattered thoughts, and recollect the necessity there was for appearing composed. She accordingly adjusted her hair, put on a morning-dress, and seated herself at a window with a book. Never was dissimulation so painful; agonized by conflicting terrors,