mind into something like visible order and
definiteness. Two points were clear, and seemed to loom up larger and
clearer the longer she thought about them; her supreme need of that
which she had not, the faith and deliverance of religion; and the
adverse influence and opposition of Mr. Carlisle in all the efforts she
might make to secure or maintain it. And under all this lurked a
thought that was like a serpent for its unrecognized coming and going
and for the sting it left,--a wish that she could put off her marriage.
No new thing in one way; Eleanor had never been willing it should be
fixed for so early a day; nevertheless she had accepted and submitted
to it, and become accustomed to the thought of it. Now repugnance
started up anew and with fresh energy. She could hardly understand
herself; her thoughts were a great turmoil; they went over and over
some of the experiences of the day, with an aimless dwelling upon them;
yet Eleanor was in general no dreamer. The words of Mr. Rhys, that had
pierced her with a sense of duty and need--the looks, that even in the
remembrance wrung her heart with their silent lesson-bearing--the
sympathy testified for herself, which intensified all her own
emotions,--and in contrast, the very tender and affectionate but
supreme manner of Mr. Carlisle, in whose power she felt she was,--the
alternation of these images and the thoughts they gave rise to, kept
Eleanor at her window, until the young moon went down behind the
western horizon and the night was dark with only stars. So dark she
felt, and miserable; and over and over and over again her cry of that
afternoon was re-echoed,--"What shall I do! what will become of me!"

Upon one thing she fixed. That Mr. Carlisle should know that he was not
going to find a gay wife in her, but one whose mind was set upon
somewhat else and upon another way of life. This would be very
distasteful to him; and he should know it. How she would manage to let
him know, Eleanor left to circumstances; but she went to bed with that
point determined.

CHAPTER VIII.

IN THE BARN.

"It hath been the longest night
That e'er I watched, and the most heaviest."

Good resolutions are sometimes excellent things, but they are
susceptible of overturns. Eleanor's met with one.

She was sitting with Mr. Carlisle the very next day, in a disturbed
mood of mind; for he and her mother had been laying plans and making
dispositions with reference to her ap