Nevertheless, this tale about a more amiable Charlotte than Werter's, so naturally also falling into the orthodox three-volume measure, is capable of being fabricated into something of deep, romantic, tragical interest; such a character, in such circumstances, in such an age, and such a place: I commend it to those of the Anglo-Gallic school, who love the domestically horrible, and delight in unsunned sorrows: but, I throw not any one topic away as a waif, for the casual passer-by to pick up on the highway.

Shadows, indeed, are flung upon the waters, but Phulax still holds the substance with tenacious teeth.
Stop awhile, my dog and shadow, and generously drop the world a morsel; be not quite so bold when no one thinks of robbing you, and spare your gasconade: the expediency of a sample has been cleverly suggested, and WE _ego et canis meus_, royal in munificence, do graciously accede.

Will this serve the purpose, my ever-pensive public?
At any rate, with some aid of intellect in readers, it is happily an extract which explains itself--the death of poor infatuated Margaret: we will suppose preliminaries, and hazard the abrupt.
* * * * * "That bitter speech shot home; it had sped like an arrow to her brain: it had flown to her heart like the breath of pestilence: for Rowland to be rough, uncourteous, unkind, might cause indeed many a pang; but such conduct had long become a habit, and woman's charitable soul excused moroseness in him, whom she loved more than life itself, more than honour.

But now, when the dread laugh of a seemingly more righteous world was daily, hourly, to be feared against her--when the cold finger of scorn was preparing to be pointed at her fading beauty, and her altered form--now, when indulgence is most due, and cruelty has a sting more scorpion than ever--to be taunted with that once-kind tongue with having rightfully inherited _a curse_--to be told, in a sort of fiendish triumph, that some ancient family grudge, forsooth, against her father's fame, certainly as much as the selfish motives of a libertine professed, had warped the will of Rowland to her ruin--to know, to hear, yea, from his own lips, that the oft-repented crime of her warm and credulous youth--of her too free, unsuspicious affection--had calmly been contrived by the heart she clung to for her first, her only love--here was misery, here was madness! "Rowland, at the approach of footsteps, had hastily slunk away behind the accustomed panel, and alone in the chamber was left poor Margaret: his last sneering speech, the mockery of his sarcastic pity, were still haunting her ear with echoes full of wretchedness; and she had uttered one faint cry, and sunk swooning on a couch, when her sister entered.
"Charlotte, gentle Charlotte, had nothing of the hardness of a heroine; her mind, as her most fair body, was delicate, nervous, spiritualized; but the instinct of imperious duty ever gave her strength in the day of trial.

Long with an elder sister's eye had she watched and feared for Margaret; she had palliated natural levity by evident warmth of disposition, and excused follies of the judgment by kindness of the heart.