e
remembrance of that touch was recalled, she drew her hand away
rapidly. Not for that had she driven from her as honest a man as had
ever wished to mate with a woman. He, George Vavasor, had never so
held her hand since the day when they had parted, and now on this
first occasion of her freedom she felt it again. What did he think of
her? Did he suppose that she could transfer her love in that way, as
a flower may be taken from one buttonhole and placed in another? He
read it all, and knew that he was hurrying on too quickly. "I can
understand well," he said in a whisper, "what your present feelings
are; but I do not think you will be really angry with me because I
have been unable to repress my joy at what I cannot but regard as
your release from a great misfortune." Then he went.

"My release!" she said, seating herself on the chair from which he
had risen. "My release from a misfortune! No;--but my fall from
heaven! Oh, what a man he is! That he should have loved me, and that
I should have driven him away from me!" Her thoughts travelled off to
the sweetness of that home at Nethercoats, to the excellence of that
master who might have been hers; and then in an agony of despair
she told herself that she had been an idiot and a fool, as well as
a traitor. What had she wanted in life that she should have thus
quarrelled with as happy a lot as ever had been offered to a woman?
Had she not been mad, when she sent from her side the only man that
she loved,--the only man that she had ever truly respected? For hours
she sat there, all alone, putting out the candles which the servant
had lighted for her, and leaving untasted the tea that was brought to
her.

Poor Alice! I hope that she may be forgiven. It was her special
fault, that when at Rome she longed for Tibur, and when at Tibur
she regretted Rome. Not that her cousin George is to be taken as
representing the joys of the great capital, though Mr Grey may be
presumed to form no inconsiderable part of the promised delights
of the country. Now that she had sacrificed her Tibur, because it
had seemed to her that the sunny quiet of its pastures lacked the
excitement necessary for the happiness of life, she was again
prepared to quarrel with the heartlessness of Rome, and already was
again sighing for the tranquillity of the country.

Sitting there, full of these regrets, she declared to herself that
she would wait for her father's return, and then, throwing herself
upon