e the sea and the sky are
blue, and the sun is warm, and the breezes are soft and laden with the
perfume of sweet flowers. We would never live in this country, would we?
I do not like it. It is cold and damp, and it chills me, chills even my
heart. Oh! I know just the life we could live together, and be very,
very happy. Write to me no more of death.

"I am quite settled down here, waiting. My duties are light, and I do
not find them irksome. Every day I realize that I did well in coming
here as a governess, and not as one seeking a home. They think that it
is because of my pride that I have willed it so. They do not know.

"Lady St Maurice tries to be kind to me in her way; but when the honeyed
words are upon her lips, I think of you and my heart is steel. She must
have been a very beautiful woman--nay, she is beautiful now! You asked
me in your first letter to watch well and to tell you whether they were
happy together. You asked me, and I tell you the truth.

"Yes! I think that of all the women whom I have ever seen, her life
seems to have flown along the most calmly and peacefully. I have never
seen a cloud upon her brow; I hate her for it. She has no right to be
happy; she who by such treachery condemned you to a living death. Once
my anger rose up so fiercely that I nearly struck her, and I had to
hurry from the room lest I should betray myself before the time. Truly
she deserves punishment, and my hand shall not shrink from inflicting
it.

"Yet, after all, is death the most complete form of punishment.
Sometimes I doubt it. I would mar the beauty of her face for ever, and
laugh. I would strike her blind gladly; I would make her a cripple for
life, without remorse, without hesitation. To see her suffer would
please me. I should have no pity!

"But death, uncle! If anything of our religion be true, would death be
so terrible a thing? Against my will I see that her life is good. She
has made her home what it should be, and her husband happy. She is a
devoted Christian, and, wet or fine, every Sunday morning before
breakfast, she goes to the little church in the village and kneels
before the altar. She visits the sick and the poor, and they love her.
For me, religion has become something of a dream. I was brought up a
Roman Catholic. What I am now I do not know! When I vowed my life to its
present purpose I filled it with new thoughts; I put my religion away
from me. I could not kneel with hate in my heart; I co