That his son might
hereafter be enabled to support the dignity of his family, it was
necessary for me to assume the veil. Alas! that heart was unfit to be
offered at an heavenly shrine, which was already devoted to an earthly
object. My affections had long been engaged by the younger son of a
neighbouring nobleman, whose character and accomplishments attracted
my early love, and confirmed my latest esteem. Our families were
intimate, and our youthful intercourse occasioned an attachment which
strengthened and expanded with our years. He solicited me of my
father, but there appeared an insuperable barrier to our union. The
family of my lover laboured under a circumstance of similar distress
with that of my own--it was noble--but poor! My father, who was
ignorant of the strength of my affection, and who considered a
marriage formed in poverty as destructive to happiness, prohibited his
suit. 'Touched with chagrin and disappointment, he immediately entered into
the service of his Neapolitan majesty, and sought in the tumultuous
scenes of glory, a refuge from the pangs of disappointed passion.
'To me, whose hours moved in one round of full uniformity--who had no
pursuit to interest--no variety to animate my drooping spirits--to me
the effort of forgetfulness was ineffectual. The loved idea of Angelo
still rose upon my fancy, and its powers of captivation, heightened by
absence, and, perhaps even by despair, pursued me with incessant
grief. I concealed in silence the anguish that preyed upon my heart,
and resigned myself a willing victim to monastic austerity. But I was
now threatened with a new evil, terrible and unexpected. I was so
unfortunate as to attract the admiration of the Marquis Marinelli, and
he applied to my father. He was illustrious at once in birth and
fortune, and his visits could only be unwelcome to me. Dreadful was
the moment in which my father disclosed to me the proposal. My
distress, which I vainly endeavoured to command, discovered the exact
situation of my heart, and my father was affected.
'After along and awful pause, he generously released me from my
sufferings by leaving it to my choice to accept the marquis, or to
assume the veil. I fell at his feet, overcome by the noble
disinterestedness of his conduct, and instantly accepted the latter.
'This affair removed entirely the disguise with which I had hitherto
guarded my heart;--my brother--my generous brother! learned the true
state of its affections. He saw the grief which prayed upon my health;
he observed it to my father, and he nobly--oh how nobly! to restore my
happiness, desired to resign apart of the estate which had already
descended to him in right of his mother. Alas! Hippolitus,' continued
Cornelia, deeply sighing, 'thy virtues deserved a better fate.'