woman, wrote warmly on the
subject, and Sir George sent her letter to Beth with a few lines of
kindly expressed encouragement from himself. He returned her
manuscript; but when Beth saw it again, she was greatly dissatisfied.
The faults her friends had pointed out to her she plainly perceived,
and more also; but she could not see the merits. Praise only made her
the more fastidious about her work; but in that way it helped her.

Sir George's kindness did not stop at criticism however. He was cut
off from her himself, and could expect no help from his wife, whose
nervous system had suffered so much from the shock of unhappy
circumstances in her youth that she could not now bear even to hear
of, let alone to be brought in contact with, any form of sorrow or
suffering; but there were other ladies--Mrs. Kilroy of Ilverthorpe,
for instance. Sir George had known her all her life, and went
specially to ask her as a favour to countenance Beth.

"I want you to be kind to Mrs. Maclure, Angelica," he said. "She's far
too good for that plausible bounder of a barber's block she's
married."

"Then why did she marry him?" Angelica interrupted, in her vivacious
way.

"Pitchforked into it at the suggestion of her friends in her infancy,
I should say, reasoning by induction," he answered. "That's generally
the explanation in these cases. But, at any rate, she's not going to
be happy with him. And she's a charming little creature, very sweet
and docile naturally, and with unusual ability, or I'm much mistaken,
and plenty of spirit, too, when she's roused, I should anticipate. But
at present, in her childish ignorance, she's yielding where she should
resist, and she'll be brutalised if no one comes to the rescue. I
don't trust that man Maclure. A man who speaks flippantly of things
that should be respected is not a man who will be scrupulous when his
own interests are concerned; and such a man has it in his power to
make the life of a girl a hell upon earth in ways which she will not
complain of, if she has no knowledge to use in self-defence; and girls
seldom have."

"As I have learnt, alas! from bitter experience in my work amongst the
victims of holy matrimony," Angelica interposed bitterly. "Oh, how
sickening it all is! Sometimes I envy Evadne in that she is able to
refuse to know."

Sir George was silent for a little, then he said, "This is likely to
be a more than usually pathetic case, because of the girl's unusual
characte