The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1888-10-03

and took her way through the
drawing-rooms opening one out
of another in a succession of rooms, all
decorated and furnished as they had been
in George the Seconds time, and with
their ceilings and panels and mantel-
pieces painted by the Watteau school.
''He really ought TO marry" she
thought; ''it makes me wretched to think
that he should go on like this"
And yet, what woman living would have
seemed to Lady Sunbury 10 be the equal
Of her brother?
She would have been sure that Venus
was a Ounce, Pallas blue, Penelope
TOOL, a Helen a wanton, and an Antigone
fright. All the graces, all the muses.,
and all the saints rolled into one would
have seemed to her either dowdy or an
eceruelee, either a humdrum nobody or a
portentous jade, if such an one had been
called Lady Guilderoy. She had most
ardent and honest desire to see her broth
er married, and yet she felt that his mar
riage would be quite intolerable to her.
For a person who prided herself on her
consistency the inconsistency OF her feel
(1ngs was an irritation.
"I should hate her. I could not help
hating her," she unused as she walked
through the drawing-rooms. "But should
always be just TO her, and l should be very
fond of the children"
Nothing, however, she knew, could be
further from her brothers intentions than
10 give her either the woman to hate or
vthe children TO adore.
He had seen all the most charming mar
riaOaa hla xuop,ar ~ Eurnra ap6 he haH
taken none OF them. So far as his life was
pledged at all it was given to a woman
whom he could not marry.
Guilderoy, lett to himself, glanced at his
neglected essay lying on the writing table.
'What is the use of saying these things?"
he thought Everything has been said
already in the Lysis. We keep repeating
il with variations OF our own, and we think
our limitations are novelty and wisdom"
He threw the written sheets between
the pages OF blotting- book, and took up
2 letter lying under them .lpd read it
,1gain; he had seaa il when II &ad arrived
<NTtrrki his other correspondence in the
forenoon. 1t was from the lady of whom
his sister did not approve.
1t was an imDassioned letter.
Now, when a man is himself in love
such letters are delightful, but when his
own passion is waning they are apt to be
wearisome.
''How much of it is love ?'' he thought.
"And how much love of proprietorship,
jealousy of possible opponents, pleasure
in flattering afiiche? God forgive mel
j have not the smallest right to be exact
ing in such matters or hypercritical, and
yet it takes so much more to satisfy me
than have ever got in these things"
He was conscious of his ingratitude.
Ill 1. i
him greatly, and had given him all they
had 10 give; and If the quality of their
love had not been equal TO some vague ex-
aggerated impossible ideal which foated
before his fancy, it had not been their
fault probably; much more probably his
own.
He Lit a match and burnt the letter, and
remembered with pang the time when a
single line from the same hand had been
worn next his heart for days after it had
been received.
"Why do our feelings only remain such
very little time at that stage?" he mused;
and he wondered if the wood-dove in the
cedar tree knew these varying and gradual
changes from ardor to indifference. He
was not actually indifferent He felt that
to become Indifferent was a possibility.
and when this is felt indifference itself is
never far off we NAV be sure. "Elle Went
pas lents; mais ellie Went"
The letter asked him to spend the
winter in Naples. He usually spent the
winter somewhere IN the south, but q
vague dislike to the south rose in him be-
fore this request.
The sense that his preeence there was
regarded as a right weakened his desire
TO go. Like all high-mettled animals, he
turned restive when he felt the pressure
zE sL l. Al.
loose on his neck he followed docilelv.
"If do 60" he thought, 81 shall have
all my days mapped out for me; / shall
be worried if / look at another woman; l
shall be told fifty times a week that am
heartless. Perhaps | am heartless, but /
/ think not; and even il one is, to be told
so perpetually does not make ones heart
/ softer"
Was he heartess7
He thought not and in this respect he
knew his own temperament. He was
even more tender-hearted than most men !;
but he had been spoiled and caressed by
fortune, and habitual self-indulgence had
1 made him apt to consider himself with an
Inconsistencies which made it less ego
rtism than habit.
He had done some things which were
( unselfish and generous in an unusual de-
gree; but they had been great things in
which the Incidence and fastidiousness of
his character had been banished by new
and strong emotions. In ordinary mat
ters he was selfish without being the least
aware of II, as indeed happens with the
majority of people.
When the letter was burnt he went to
one of the windows and looked out. The
day was closing in, and the shadows were
taking the colors from the autumnal
flowers and making the woods beyond
look black and forbidding, while a few
red leaves were being driven along the
! terrace under a breeze which had sud-
denly risen and blew fresh from the sea-
A winter here would be uncomfortable, he
thought. II was very many winters since
/ he had seen Ladysrood in the winter
! months. None of the sports of winter
were agreeable to him, and he did not care
for house parties, which required an
amount of attention and observ-
nance from host very distasteful
his temperament He usually
me here only when he wished for
tire solitude, and the gentry of bis
nty sighed in vain for the various en-
hinments, the balls, the dinners, and
hunting breakfasts, to which. had