This inhuman speech, the threats which it contained, the dreadful sufferings foretold to me by the domina, and her prayers for my infant’s death, on whom though unborn I already doted, were more than my exhausted frame could support. Uttering a deep groan, I fell senseless at the feet of my unrelenting enemy. I know not how long I remained in this situation; but I imagine that some time must have elapsed before my recovery, since it sufficed the prioress and her nuns to quit the cavern. When my senses returned, I found myself in silence and solitude. I heard not even the retiring footsteps of my persecutors. All was hushed, and all was dreadful! I had been thrown upon the bed of straw: the heavy chain which I had already eyed with terror, was wound around my waist, and fastened me to the wall. A lamp glimmering with dull, melancholy rays through my dungeon, permitted my distinguishing all its horrors: it was separated from the cavern by a low and irregular wall of stone: a large chasm was left open in it which formed the entrance, for door there was none. A leaden crucifix was in front of my straw couch. A tattered rug lay near me, as did also a chaplet of beads; and not far from me stood a pitcher of water, and a wicker basket containing a small loaf, and a bottle of oil to supply my lamp.

With a despondent eye did I examine this scene of suffering: when I reflected that I was doomed to pass in it the remainder of my days, my heart was rent with bitter anguish. I had once been taught to look forward to a lot so different! At one time my prospects had appeared so bright, so flattering! Now all was lost to me. Friends, comfort, society, happiness, in one moment I was deprived of all! Dead to the world, dead to pleasure, I lived to nothing but the sense of misery. How fair did that world seem to me, from which I was forever excluded! How many loved objects did it contain, whom I never should behold again! As I threw a look of terror round my prison, as I shrunk from the cutting wind which howled through my subterraneous dwelling, the change seemed so striking, so abrupt, that I doubted its reality.