rmured the boy.

Mowbray smiled again as sadly as before, and said:

"Well, I see you are determined to make me your devoted friend, by
reaching my heart through my vanity. But let me continue. I said that
the obstacles in my way were not objections on the part of Philippa's
friends--that was her name, Philippa: do not ask me more."

"No," said the boy.

"The barrier was her own nature. I had mistaken it; in the height of
my pride I had dreamed that my vision had pierced to the bottom of her
nature, to the inmost recesses of her heart: I was mistaken. I had
gazed upon the woman, throwing the heiress out of the question; you
see I was hopelessly enslaved by the woman before dreaming of the
heiress," he added, with a melancholy smile.

Hoffland made no reply.

"Now I come to the end, and I shall not detain you much longer from
the moral. I visited her repeatedly. I found more to admire than I
expected even--more to be repelled by, however, than my mind had
prepared me for. I found this young girl with many noble
qualities--but these qualities seemed to me obscured by her eternal
consciousness of riches: her suspicion, in itself an unwomanly trait,
was intense."

"Oh, sir!" cried the boy, "but surely there is some excuse! Of
course," he added, with an effort to control his feelings, "I do not
know Miss Philippa, but assuredly a young girl who is cursed with
great wealth must discriminate between those who love her for herself
and those who come to woo her because she is wealthy. Oh, believe me,
it is, it must be very painful to be wealthy, to have to suspect and
doubt--to run the hazard of wounding some noble nature, who may be by
chance among the sordid crowd who come to kneel to her because she is
an heiress--who would turn their backs upon her were she portionless.
Indeed, we should excuse much."

"Yes," said Mowbray, "and you defend the cause of heiresses well. But
let me come back to my narrative. The suspicion of this young girl was
immense--as her fortune was. That fortune chilled me whenever I
thought of it. I did not want it. I could have married her--I had
quite enough for both. Heaven decreed that she should be wealthy,
however--that the glitter of gold should blind her heart--that she
should suspect my motives. Do not understand me to say that she placed
any value upon that wealth herself. No; I believe she despised, almost
regretted it: but still, who can tell? At least I love her too much
still to