riage was then beyond her reach! Her two cousins had succeeded in
blighting all the hopes of her life;--but what could she now think
of herself in that she had been so weak as to submit to such usage
from their hands? Alas!--she told herself, admitting in her misery
all her weakness,--alas, she had no mother. She had gloried in her
independence, and this had come of it! She had scorned the prudence
of Lady Macleod, and her scorn had brought her to this pass!

Was she to give herself bodily,--body and soul, as she said aloud in
her solitary agony,--to a man whom she did not love? Must she submit
to his caresses,--lie on his bosom,--turn herself warmly to his
kisses? "No," she said, "no,"--speaking audibly, as she walked about
the room; "no;--it was not in my bargain; I never meant it." But if
so what had she meant;--what had been her dream? Of what marriage had
she thought, when she was writing that letter back to George Vavasor?
How am I to analyse her mind, and make her thoughts and feelings
intelligible to those who may care to trouble themselves with the
study? Any sacrifice she would make for her cousin which one friend
could make for another. She would fight his battles with her money,
with her words, with her sympathy. She would sit with him if he
needed it, and speak comfort to him by the hour. His disgrace should
be her disgrace;--his glory her glory;--his pursuits her pursuits.
Was not that the marriage to which she had consented? But he had come
to her and asked her for a kiss, and she had shuddered before him,
when he made the demand. Then that other one had come and had touched
her hand, and the fibres of her body had seemed to melt within her at
the touch, so that she could have fallen at his feet.

She had done very wrong. She knew that she had done wrong. She knew
that she had sinned with that sin which specially disgraces a woman.
She had said that she would become the wife of a man to whom she
could not cleave with a wife's love; and, mad with a vile ambition,
she had given up the man for whose modest love her heart was longing.
She had thrown off from her that wondrous aroma of precious delicacy,
which is the greatest treasure of womanhood. She had sinned against
her sex; and, in an agony of despair, as she crouched down upon the
floor with her head against her chair, she told herself that there
was no pardon for her. She understood it now, and knew that she could
not forgive herself.

But can you f