He burst into tears, overwhelmed at once with misery and shame.
'It may be,' he sobbed, 'that she was innocent.

Suffering had driven me mad, and I uttered words such as never should have passed my lips.

If she is guiltless, there lives no baser man than I.For I reproached her--my father, how you will scorn me!--I cast at her in reproach her father's treachery.' The abbot's brow rested upon his hand.

It was thus he had listened, unmoving, throughout the story; nor did he now stir, until Basil, having ceased alike from speaking and from tears, had sat for a little while in stillness and reflection.

Then at length he turned his eyes upon the young man, and spoke with sad gravity.
'Even so, even so.