'Hippolitus!' said Julia, in a tremulous accent, 'Hippolitus, Count de
Vereza!'--'The same,' replied the nun, in a tone of surprize. Julia
was speechless; tears, however, came to her relief. The astonishment
of Cornelia for some moment surpassed expression; at length a gleam of
recollection crossed her mind, and she too well understood the scene
before her. Julia, after some time revived, when Cornelia tenderly
approaching her, 'Do I then embrace my sister!' said she. 'United in
sentiment, are we also united in misfortune?' Julia answered with her
sighs, and their tears flowed in mournful sympathy together. At length
Cornelia resumed her narrative.
'My father, struck with the conduct of Hippolitus, paused upon the
offer. The alteration in my health was too obvious to escape his
notice; the conflict between pride and parental tenderness, held him
for some time in indecision, but the latter finally subdued every
opposing feeling, and he yielded his consent to my marriage with
Angelo. The sudden transition from grief to joy was almost too much
for my feeble frame; judge then what must have been the effect of the
dreadful reverse, when the news arrived that Angelo had fallen in a
foreign engagement! Let me obliterate, if possible, the impression of
sensations so dreadful. The sufferings of my brother, whose generous
heart could so finely feel for another's woe, were on this occasion
inferior only to my own.
'After the first excess of my grief was subsided, I desired to retire
from a world which had tempted me only with illusive visions of
happiness, and to remove from those scenes which prompted
recollection, and perpetuated my distress. My father applauded my
resolution, and I immediately was admited a noviciate into this
monastery, with the Superior of which my father had in his youth been
acquainted. 'At the expiration of the year I received the veil. Oh! I well
remember with what perfect resignation, with what comfortable
complacency I took those vows which bound me to a life of retirement,
and religious rest.
'The high importance of the moment, the solemnity of the ceremony, the
sacred glooms which surrounded me, and the chilling silence that
prevailed when I uttered the irrevocable vow--all conspired to impress
my imagination, and to raise my views to heaven. When I knelt at the
altar, the sacred flame of pure devotion glowed in my heart, and
elevated my soul to sublimity. The world and all its recollections
faded from my mind, and left it to the influence of a serene and, holy
enthusiasm which no words can describe.
'Soon after my noviciation, I had the misfortune to lose my dear
father. In the tranquillity of this monastery, however, in the
soothing kindness of my companions, and in devotional exercises, my
sorrows found relief, and the sting of grief was blunted. My repose
was of short continuance. A circumstance occurred that renewed the
misery, which, can now never quit me but in the grave, to which I look
with no fearful apprehension, but as a refuge from calamity, trusting
that the power who has seen good to afflict me, will pardon the
imperfectness of my devotion, and the too frequent wandering of my
thoughts to the object once so dear to me.'