There was some degree of relationship between your grandfather and

myself; and your mother was attached to me by the ties of sentiment,

which, as we grew up, united us still more strongly than those of

blood. Our pleasures and our tastes were the same; and a similarity of

misfortunes might, perhaps, contribute to cement our early friendship.

I, like herself, had lost a parent in the eruption of AEtna. My mother

had died before I understood her value; but my father, whom I revered

and tenderly loved, was destroyed by one of those terrible events; his

lands were buried beneath the lava, and he left an only son and myself

to mourn his fate, and encounter the evils of poverty. The count, who

was our nearest surviving relation, generously took us home to his

house, and declared that he considered us as his children. To amuse

his leisure hours, he undertook to finish the education of my brother,

who was then about seventeen, and whose rising genius promised to

reward the labours of the count. Louisa and myself often shared the

instruction of her father, and at those hours Orlando was generally of

the party.

The tranquil retirement of the count's situation, the

rational employment of his time between his own studies, the education

of those whom he called his children, and the conversation of a few

select friends, anticipated the effect of time, and softened the

asperities of his distress into a tender complacent melancholy. As for

Louisa and myself, who were yet new in life, and whose spirits

possessed the happy elasticity of youth, our minds gradually shifted

from suffering to tranquillity, and from tranquillity to happiness. I

have sometimes thought that when my brother has been reading to her a

delightful passage, the countenance of Louisa discovered a tender

interest, which seemed to be excited rather by the reader than by the

author. These days, which were surely the most enviable of our lives,

now passed in serene enjoyments, and in continual gradations of

improvement.

'The count designed my brother for the army, and the time now drew

nigh when he was to join the Sicilian regiment, in which he had a

commission. The absent thoughts, and dejected spirits of my cousin,

now discovered to me the secret which had long been concealed even

from herself; for it was not till Orlando was about to depart, that

she perceived how dear he was to her peace. On the eve of his

departure, the count lamented, with fatherly yet manly tenderness, the

distance which was soon to separate us. "But we shall meet again,"

said he, "when the honors of war shall have rewarded the bravery of my

son." Louisa grew pale, a half suppressed sigh escaped her, and, to

conceal her emotion, she turned to her harpsichord.




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