MADEMOISELLE ANGELA. 173

nurse fed him from them, and the child finding how
good they were was never satisfied with them ; when
she thought that he had had enough, she took the
cakes out and said, “ Now he might have everything
he could find there.” Down went the little fat hand,
but there was not much to find, and still the little
fellow kept groping down, in the hope that there
might yet be something; at last, up he brought a
crumpled piece of paper—a closely crumpled letter,
which seemed to have lain there a long time. His
mother saw it—a letter in a female hand—it excited
her curiosity ; she took it and read it. She read it,
looked hurriedly at the address, grew pale, and care-
fully folding it up put it in her reticule. She called
to the coachman, and bade him turn back ; she had
altered her mind, and would go no farther that day.

The boy laughed and prattled on the homeward
drive, but his mother neither heard nor saw him.
A terrible secret had been revealed to her, and she
could think of nothing but that,

On her return home she shut herself in her
chamber ; her husband was out on one of his hasty
rides, and she re-read the letter. It was that letter
which had been lost, that heart-breaking letter from
Marianne to her brother. All was now clear to his
wife. Her husband was then in reality the son of
that unfortunate convict, Edwards—he did not bear
his proper name—her child was descended from such
& parentage. That might be galling to a proud spirit,
but it was nothing to the cruel sense that she had
been deceived, wilfully and deliberately deceived by
her husband ; and then that he had suffered these
unfortunate relatives to suffer want—to die, perhaps

Q 2