into a sin--more apt to be deceived than to incur a
necessity for being deceitful: and if you have a keen eye for
physiognomy, you will have detected that the Countess Czerlaski loved
herself far too well to get entangled in an unprofitable vice.

How then, you will say, could this fine lady choose to quarter herself on
the establishment of a poor curate, where the carpets were probably
falling into holes, where the attendance was limited to a maid of all
work, and where six children were running loose from eight o'clock in the
morning till eight o'clock in the evening? Surely you must be
misrepresenting the facts.

Heaven forbid! For not having a lofty imagination, as you perceive, and
being unable to invent thrilling incidents for your amusement, my only
merit must lie in the truth with which I represent to you the humble
experience of an ordinary fellow-mortal. I wish to stir your sympathy
with commonplace troubles--to win your tears for real sorrow: sorrow such
as may live next door to you--such as walks neither in rags nor in
velvet, but in very ordinary decent apparel.

Therefore, that you may dismiss your suspicions of my veracity, I will
beg you to consider, that at the time the Countess Czerlaski left Camp
Villa in dudgeon, she had only twenty pounds in her pocket, being about
one-third of the income she possessed independently of her brother. You
will then perceive that she was in the extremely inconvenient predicament
of having quarrelled, not indeed with her bread and cheese, but certainly
with her chicken and tart--a predicament all the more inconvenient to
her, because the habit of idleness had quite unfitted her for earning
those necessary superfluities, and because, with all her fascinations,
she had not secured any enthusiastic friends whose houses were open to
her, and who were dying to see her. Thus she had completely checkmated
herself, unless she could resolve on one unpleasant move--namely, to
humble herself to her brother, and recognize his wife. This seemed quite
impossible to her as long as she entertained the hope that he would make
the first advances; and in this flattering hope she remained month after
month at Shepperton Vicarage, gracefully overlooking the deficiencies of
accommodation, and feeling that she was really behaving charmingly. 'Who
indeed,' she thought to herself, 'could do otherwise, with a lovely,
gentle creature like Milly? I shall really be sorry to leave the poor
thing.'