lonely and desolate before, is gradually entwining around a cherished object, and drawing its purest happiness from a kindred soul—a glorious era, to have a consciousness, in waking thoughts and in the fantasies of dreams, that there is one mind, one heart, to share our joys and sorrows, and roll back the clouds from the horizon of life! And this delightful era is now mine! O, Mercado, what bliss is mine when my thoughts are on thee! What raptures fill my soul, as my fervent hopes paint the future as an endless heaven, reaching far away, through paths made lovely and fragrant by the most gorgeous flowers—all of which shall be shared with me by thee, while our days glide smoothly on, and naught but love and happiness shall preside over the weaving of a single page in our book of life!"
As the lovely woman paused in her rhapsody, a liveried servant entered.
"Donna Lucretia," he said, "there is an old woman, a fortune-teller, in the reception-room, who desires to be admitted to your presence."
"Show her in," was the reply. "A fortune-teller! She will read in my face that I am in love; she will perceive that my passion is reciprocated; and then she will promise me long years of happiness with Mercado, and crown the hopes of this hour"
She paused, for the fortune-teller had entered. She was an old, very old woman, with wrinkled visage, and attenuated form. She was clad in a flowing mantle, that added to the wildness of her appearance. Her eyes were deeply sunken in their sockets, and gleamed out from beneath her o'er-hanging brows, like funeral lights from some dark cavern in the bowels of earth. Her dark features were
