'In the evening, after prayers, the principal bade us stay;
and, in a grave, sad voice, summoned forth Mariana to answer
charges to be made against her.
'Mariana stood up and leaned against the chimney-piece. Then
eight of the older girls came forward, and preferred
against her charges,--alas! too well founded, of calumny and
falsehood.
'At first, she defended herself with self-possession and
eloquence. But when she found she could no more resist the
truth, she suddenly threw herself down, dashing her head with
all her force against the iron hearth, on which a fire was
burning, and was taken up senseless.
'The affright of those present was great. Now that they had
perhaps killed her, they reflected it would have been as
well if they had taken warning from the former occasion, and
approached very carefully a nature so capable of any extreme.
After a while she revived, with a faint groan, amid the sobs
of her companions. I was on my knees by the bed, and held her
cold hand. One of those most aggrieved took it from me, to beg
her pardon, and say, it was impossible not to love her. She
made no reply.
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