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the worst of crimes, that of bringing the scythe of foreign despotism to
cut away the new springing liberties of her country, would have followed
her application to any among the Greeks.
She knew that she was the cause of her husband's utter ruin; and she strung
herself to bear the consequences. The reproaches which agony extorted; or
worse, cureless, uncomplaining depression, when his mind was sunk in a
torpor, not the less painful because it was silent and moveless. She
reproached herself with the crime of his death; guilt and its punishments
appeared to surround her; in vain she endeavoured to allay remorse by the
memory of her real integrity; the rest of the world, and she among them,
judged of her actions, by their consequences. She prayed for her husband's
soul; she conjured the Supreme to place on her head the crime of his
self-destruction--she vowed to live to expiate his fault.
In the midst of such wretchedness as must soon have destroyed her, one
thought only was matter of consolation. She lived in the same country,
breathed the same air as Raymond. His name as Protector was the burthen of
every tongue; his achievements, projects, and magnificence, the argument of
every story. Nothing is so precious to a woman's heart as the glory and
excellence of him she loves; thus in every horror Evadne revelled in his
fame and prosperity. While her husband lived, this feeling was regarded by
her as a crime, repressed, repented of. When he died, the tide of love
resumed its ancient flow, it deluged her soul with its tumultuous waves,
and she gave herself up a prey to its uncontrollable power.
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