ad acres, and that old coveted family
honour. And this Owen still loved her daughter--loved her not as
Herbert did, with a quiet, gentleman-like, every-day attachment, but
with the old, true, passionate love of which she had read in books,
and dreamed herself, before she had sold herself to be a countess.
That Owen did so love her daughter, she was very sure. And then, as
to her daughter; that she did not still love this new heir in her
heart of hearts--of that the mother was by no means sure. That her
child had chosen the better part in choosing money and a title, she
had not doubted; and that having so chosen Clara would be happy,--of
that also she did not doubt. Clara was young, she would say, and her
heart in a few months would follow her hand.

But now! How was she to decide, sitting there with Herbert Fitzgerald
before her, gloomy as death, cold, shivering, and muddy, telling of
his own disasters with no more courage than a whipped dog? As she
looked at him she declared to herself twenty times in half a second
that he had not about him a tithe of the manhood of his cousin Owen.
Women love a bold front, and a voice that will never own its master
to have been beaten in the world's fight. Had Owen came there with
such a story, he would have claimed his right boldly to the lady's
hand, in spite of all that the world had done to him.

"Let her have him," said Lady Desmond to herself; and the struggle
within her bosom was made and over. No wonder that Herbert, looking
into her face for pity, should find that she was harsh and cruel. She
had been sacrificing herself, and had completed the sacrifice. Owen
Fitzgerald, the heir to Castle Richmond, Sir Owen as he would soon
be, should have her daughter. They two, at any rate, should be happy.
And she--she would live there at Desmond Court, lonely as she had
ever lived. While all this was passing through her mind, she hardly
thought of Herbert and his sorrows. That he must be given up and
abandoned, and left to make what best fight he could by himself; as
to that how was it possible that she as a mother should have any
doubt?

And yet it was a pity--a thousand pities. Herbert Fitzgerald, with
his domestic virtues, his industry and thorough respectability, would
so exactly have suited Clara's taste and mode of life--had he only
continued to be the heir of Castle Richmond. She and Owen would not
enter upon the world together with nearly the same fair chance of
happiness. Wh