l
like those of her new companions, but of comparatively cheap
materials. As we passed the threshold, Eveena gently and tacitly but
decisively assigned to her _protegee_ her own place beside me, and put
her right hand in my left. The agitation with which it manifestly
trembled, though neither strange nor unpleasing, added to the extreme
embarrassment I felt; and I had placed her next to Eunane in the
carriage and taken my seat beside Eveena, whom I never permitted to
resign her own, before a single spoken word had passed in this
extraordinary courtship, or sanctioned the brief and practical
ceremony of marriage.

I was alone in my own room that evening when a gentle scratching on
the window-crystal entreated admission. I answered without looking up,
assuming that Eveena alone would seek me there. But hers were not the
lips that were earnestly pressed on my hand, nor hers the voice that
spoke, trembling and hesitating with stronger feeling than it could
utter in words--

"I do thank you from my heart. I little thought you would wish to make
me so happy. I shrank from showing you the letter lest you should
think I dared to hope.... It is not only Velna; it is such strange joy
and comfort to be held fast by one who cares--to feel safe in hands as
kind as they are strong. You said you could love none save Eveena;
but, Clasfempta, your way of not loving is something better, gentler,
more considerate than any love I ever hoped or heard of."

I could read only profound sincerity and passionate gratitude in the
clear bright eyes, softened by half-suppressed tears, that looked up
from where she knelt beside me. But the exaggeration was painfully
suggestive, confirming the ugly view Enva had given yesterday of the
life that seemed natural and reasonable to her race, and made ordinary
human kindness appear something strange and romantic by contrast.

"Surely, Eunane, every man wishes those around him happy, if it do not
cost too much to make them so?"

"No, indeed! Oftener the master finds pleasure in punishing and
humiliating, the favourite in witnessing her companions' tears and
terror. They like to see the household grateful for an hour's
amusement, crouching to caprice, incredulously thankful for barest
justice. One book much read in our schools says that 'cruelty is a
stronger, earlier, and more tenacious human instinct than sympathy;'
and another that 'half the pleasure of power lies in giving pain, and
half the remai