“’Tis my first venture into the unhallowed limits of your licentious court; and through the grace that hath preserved me harmless, I here resolve it shall be my last.  By your instructions, Sir John, I relied implicitly on the protection of your friend.  He would fain have abused his trust, but I escaped from the offered insult.  Struggling to free my hand from his grasp, by yonder hill-side, I lost my footing.  I fell down the steep unhurt.  Fear lent me unwonted strength, and I escaped unseen, round the narrow pathway.  My discourteous knight thought, doubtless, I had tumbled into the roaring abyss; for the night mist hung below, and I heard a huge fragment of rock, loosened in my descent, plunge into the dimly-rolling waters.  Now, hear me:  my resolve is taken, and no earthly influence or persuasion shall stay me. 1 was bewildered, yet flattered by your follies:  foolish and thoughtless enough to frolic and flutter on the very brink of a precipice.  I was dazzled by the glittering but dangerous excitement.  Conscience spoke, but I durst not listen.  My course of life hitherto has been through scenes of gentleness and peace, and I could not look on your bustle and dissipation without alarm.  Yet was I persuaded to mingle in your sports yesterday—­that day hallowed by the last fiat of its Creator, wherein the soul, freed awhile from the cares of earth, may prostrate itself in homage before Him who said, ’It is mine!’ Justly punished for trifling with my better thoughts, my escape shall not be without its acknowledgment.”

Sir John was silent.  She stood before him like some purer, brighter thing than could be deemed akin to this polluted earth.

“Those siren waves were bearing me on to the gulf where”—­She paused a moment, shuddering at the dark retrospect of the past.  “Where all your pomp and pageantry will be overwhelmed, and yourselves, for ever, in the same irretrievable ruin!”

Sir John looked uneasy, and his eye wandered, as if in search of some object wherewith to throw off these gloomy anticipations.  The maiden again spoke:—­

“It seemed as though a veil, invisible heretofore, were suddenly undrawn.  The glory and the baseness, the splendour and the pollution, were at once revealed.  The hand unseen had drawn it aside.  I would now shun—­I hope for ever—–­ these paths of folly; and I bid farewell to your pleasures without a murmur or a regret.”

Sir John, courtier though he was, ardently and willingly rendering homage at the shrine of pleasure and dissipation, was awe-struck.  Conscience echoed a fearful response; and he shrank before the reproof he could not shun.

“Without regret!” said he, faltering and abashed.  “I had hoped—­perhaps wished—­but it was too presumptuous.  My purest thoughts would have sullied so pure a shrine.”

“Stay, Sir John; though the confession be humbling to a maiden’s pride, yet my heart tells me ’tis the last time we meet; and it is the only acknowledgment,—­I render it to your honesty and good faith.”  Her voice grew hesitating and tremulous.  “There was a tendril twining about my heart; but it is wrung off, and I am again—­alone!”