ts?"

"Oh!" said Helen, "if I had but been born to what I possess."

"Mr. Stokes said if you had been born an honourable, you would have
grasped at a coronet."

"And I _may_ have it yet," replied the discontented beauty, with
a weary smile; "I _may_ have it yet; my husband's brother is still
childless. If I could be but certain that the grave would receive him
a childless man, how proudly I would take precedence of such a woman
as Lady G----"

Rose looked at her as she spoke. In the glorious meridian of her
beauty--a creature so splendid--of such a fair outside--with energy,
and grace, and power--married by a weak ambition--an ambition achieved
by the accident of birth--an ambition having neither honour, nor
virtue, nor patriotism, nor any one laudable aim, for its object. And
she sorrowed in her inmost soul for her cousin Helen.

CHAPTER VII.

Rose never, of course, made one at the brilliant assemblies which Mrs.
Ivers gave and graced; she only saw those who breakfasted or lunched
in the square, or who, like the little old gentleman, and one or two
others, joined the family circle. The excitement of an election,
and the (_pro tem._) equality which such an event creates, brought
her more into contact with her cousin's acquaintances than she had
yet been, and gave the gentleman, who evidently admired her, an
opportunity of studying her character. There was something strange
in a young woman, situated as was Rose, preserving so entirely her
self-respect, that it encircled her like a halo; and wherever it is
so preserved, it invariably commands the respect of others. After the
first week or two had passed, Rose Dillon was perfectly undazzled by
the splendour with which she was surrounded, and was now engaged in
watching for a moment when she could escape from what she knew was
splendid misery. If Helen had been simply content to keep her own
position--if she had, as Rose's wisdom advised, sufficient moral
courage to resent a slight openly, not denying her humble birth, and
yet resolved to be treated as became her husband's wife--all would
have been happiness and peace. Proud as Mr. Ivers was of her, her
discontent and perpetual straining after rank and distinction,
watching every body's every look and movement to discover if it
concealed no _covert_ affront, rendered him, kind and careful
though he was, occasionally dissatisfied; and she interpreted every
manifestation of his displeasure, however slight, to