ing language? Although there hangs a mystery
over my birth, surely there rests upon it no dishonor.
Acquaint me, then, once more I charge you, and now
by the love and kindness that you have always
shown to me, declare, for you know -- I say I feel you
know; whose child am I, where was I born, how
have I been committed to your care, adopted, cherish-
ed; I, who have no filial claims upon you; adjudged
to be an orphan, perhaps the child of charity; how
have I been divided between you and my guardian,
or held as if I were your mutual bond? Inform me,
Mona, my good Mona, foster-mother, nurse, you who
have been to me as a true mother might be, say
whose I am; whether, and where, my parents live;
and, if they live, why they have thus abandoned
me," and she burst into a flood of tears.

"Quiet yourself, my fond one," answered Mona,
moved also to tears by this appeal; "your birth on
one side is as high as any that this country boasts,
therefore is as high as Claude Montigny's. Your mo-
ther is descended from a warlike Scottish line,
your father's father was an English peer. Your pa-
rents are yet living; but their union, which was in
many points unequal, was, alas! rendered the more
unequal by a gulf-like disproportion in the passion
that provoked it; -- a gulf, too, that was undiscovered,
till, too late, your mother saw it. Thence, their
lives, their loves, so call it, their mutual progress
(save on the course of fondness towards yourself,
their child, whereon they journey equal side by side)
has for years kept, and yet keeps, a still disparting
pace; and, oh, Amanda, excuse these tears, for well I
know your mother, and pity her, having many a

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v?