here."

"Indeed it is, Adolphus," said she. "You mistake my character. I'm not
at all anxious for London parties and gaiety. Stupid as you may think
me, I'm quite as well contented to stay here as I should be to go to
London."

"Do you mean me to believe," said Kilcullen, with a gentle laugh,
"that you are contented to live and die in single blessedness at Grey
Abbey?--that your ambition does not soar higher than the interchange of
worsted-work patterns with Miss O'Joscelyn?"

"I did not say so, Adolphus."

"What is your ambition then? what kind and style of life would you
choose to live? Come, Fanny, I wish I could get you to talk with me
about yourself. I wish I could teach you to believe how anxious I am
that your future life should be happy and contented, and at the same
time splendid and noble, as it should be. I'm sure you must have
ambition. I have studied Lavater [47] well enough to know that such
a head and face as yours never belonged to a mind that could satisfy
itself with worsted-work."

[FOOTNOTE 47: Lavater--Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741-1801),
Swiss writer whose only widely read book was a
tract on physiognomy (Physiognomische Fragmente
zur Befoerderung der Menschenkenntnis und
Menschenliebe). The Victorians put much stock in
physiognomy.]

"You are very severe on the poor worsted-work."

"But am I not in the right?"

"Decidedly not. Lavater, and my head and face, have misled you."

"Nonsense, Fanny. Do you mean to tell me that you have no aspiration
for a kind of life different from this you are leading?--If so, I am
much disappointed in you; much, very much astray in my judgment of your
character." Then he walked on a few yards, looking on the ground, and
said, "Come, Fanny, I am talking very earnestly to you, and you answer
me only in joke. You don't think me impertinent, do you, to talk about
yourself?"

"Impertinent, Adolphus--of course I don't."

"Why won't you talk to me then, in the spirit in which I am talking to
you? If you knew, Fanny, how interested I am about you, how anxious
that you should be happy, how confidently I look forward to the
distinguished position I expect you to fill--if you could guess how
proud I mean to be of you, when you are the cynosure of all eyes--the
admired of all admirers--admired not more for your beauty than your
talent--if I could make you believe, Fa