y, new to the actual world
of civilized toils and pleasures, fresh from the adventures of Eastern
wanderings, and full of golden dreams of poetry before it settles
into authorship or action! She missed the brilliant errors, the daring
aspirations,--even the animated gestures and eager eloquence,--that had
interested and enamoured her in the loiterer by the shores of Baiae, or
amidst the tomb-like chambers of Pompeii. For the Maltravers now before
her--wiser, better, nobler, even handsomer than of yore (for he was one
whom manhood became better than youth)--the Frenchwoman could at any
period have felt friendship without danger. It seemed to her, not as it
really was, the natural _development_, but the very _contrast_, of the
ardent, variable, imaginative boy, by whose side she had gazed at night
on the moonlit waters and rosy skies of the soft Parthenope! How does
time, after long absence, bring to us such contrasts between the one we
remember and the one we see! And what a melancholy mockery does it seem
of our own vain hearts, dreaming of impressions never to be changed, and
affections that never can grow cool!

And now, as they conversed with all the ease of cordial and guileless
friendship, how did Valerie rejoice in secret that upon that friendship
there rested no blot of shame! and that she had not forfeited those
consolations for a home without love, which had at last settled into
cheerful nor unhallowed resignation,--consolations only to be found in
the conscience and the pride!

M. de Ventadour had not altered, except that his nose was longer, and
that he now wore a peruque in full curl instead of his own straight
hair. But somehow or other--perhaps by the mere charm of custom--he had
grown more pleasing in Valerie's eyes; habit had reconciled her to his
foibles, deficiencies, and faults; and, by comparison with others,
she could better appreciate his good qualities, such as they
were,--generosity, good-temper, good-nature, and unbounded indulgence
to herself. Husband and wife have so many interests in common, that when
they have jogged on through the ups and downs of life a sufficient
time, the leash which at first galled often grows easy and familiar; and
unless the _temper_, or rather the disposition and the heart, of
either be insufferable, what was once a grievous yoke becomes but a
companionable tie. And for the rest, Valerie, now that sentiment and
fancy were sobered down, could take pleasure in a thous