yond depth of passion and sadness, lights
of poetry and hope, blacknesses of despair, and thoughts that were above
the earth. It was a lovely body, but the inmate, the soul, was more than
worthy of that lodging. Should I leave this incomparable flower to
wither unseen on these rough mountains? Should I despise the great gift
offered me in the eloquent silence of her eyes? Here was a soul immured;
should I not burst its prison? All side considerations fell off from me;
were she the child of Herod I swore I should make her mine; and that very
evening I set myself, with a mingled sense of treachery and disgrace, to
captivate the brother. Perhaps I read him with more favourable eyes,
perhaps the thought of his sister always summoned up the better qualities
of that imperfect soul; but he had never seemed to me so amiable, and his
very likeness to Olalla, while it annoyed, yet softened me.

A third day passed in vain--an empty desert of hours. I would not lose a
chance, and loitered all afternoon in the court where (to give myself a
countenance) I spoke more than usual with the Senora. God knows it was
with a most tender and sincere interest that I now studied her; and even
as for Felipe, so now for the mother, I was conscious of a growing warmth
of toleration. And yet I wondered. Even while I spoke with her, she
would doze off into a little sleep, and presently awake again without
embarrassment; and this composure staggered me. And again, as I marked
her make infinitesimal changes in her posture, savouring and lingering on
the bodily pleasure of the movement, I was driven to wonder at this depth
of passive sensuality. She lived in her body; and her consciousness was
all sunk into and disseminated through her members, where it luxuriously
dwelt. Lastly, I could not grow accustomed to her eyes. Each time she
turned on me these great beautiful and meaningless orbs, wide open to the
day, but closed against human inquiry--each time I had occasion to
observe the lively changes of her pupils which expanded and contracted in
a breath--I know not what it was came over me, I can find no name for the
mingled feeling of disappointment, annoyance, and distaste that jarred
along my nerves. I tried her on a variety of subjects, equally in vain;
and at last led the talk to her daughter. But even there she proved
indifferent; said she was pretty, which (as with children) was her
highest word of commendation, but was plainly inc