This victim of monastic cruelty was indeed no other than the unfortunate Agnes. During her abode in the convent, she had been well known to Virginia: but her emaciated form, her features altered by affliction, her death universally credited, and her overgrown and matted hair which hung over her face and bosom in disorder at first had prevented her being recollected. The prioress had put every artifice in practice to induce Virginia to take the veil; for the heiress of Villa-Franca would have been no despicable acquisition. Her seeming kindness and unremitted attention so far succeeded that her young relation began to think seriously upon compliance. Better instructed in the disgust and ennui of a monastic life, Agnes had penetrated the designs of the domina: she trembled for the innocent girl, and endeavoured to make her sensible of her error. She painted in their true colours the numerous inconveniencies attached to a convent, the continued restraint, the low jealousies, the petty intrigues, the servile court and gross flattery expected by the superior.