Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1898-10-27

somewhat brutal attitude of command
was love-making in his way-a way
analogous to that of the savage who
first knocks his intended wife senseless
and then carries her of to his own hut
in the bush-his conquest, lover. wife
and victim all in one.
She had her choice then between the
two. In Gerald she would find a spirit
of domination that would crush her to
the earth "a materialistic, unpoetic
kind of nature that would leave her
soul as arid as the paFched sands of the
Libyan desert-a tyrant, a master, &
conqueror. In Giulio di Siena she
would have infidelity, intrigue, jeal-
ousy, and what to an Englishwoman,
accustomed to much open-air exercise
and absolute freedom of movement,
would be practically incarceration.
In the princess she would have a
mother-in-law who would rule her with
. rod of iron, and never take her to her
heart as a daughter-who would perse-
cute her to become a Catholic; who
would ridicule her English ways and
decry her nationality; who would
make up for her husbands neglect by
system of espionage which would not
leave her one shred of spontaneous
freedom, and who in all of whose per-
secutions here, and glacial barriers
there, would be joined by her married
daughter, La Contessa Maria del Sole
(~ho would repeat and exaggerate all
that her mother might say and dol. OF
the two the balance of unhappiness
would be on the side of the Italian, but
neither man would treat her well, and
in marriage with each alike would
be her misery.
The two aspirants had nearly come
TO that duel, with the buttons off,
which seemed a. If it must eventually
take place, over the fifth seat in the
carriage, which meant who should sit
outside with the eoachman. The fric-
ton had been SO great, and the courtesy
disguise so thin, that the princess had
half-laughingly proposed drawing lots
for the chance. But, perhaps because
she had proposed it, perhaps because
he disdained to put himself in any
sense on an equality with the despised
Italian, Gerald had rejected this ar
rangement. With as much haughti-
ness as sullenness he had flung up the
contest by mounting the box, whence
he revenged himself by turning
round and engrossing, so far as
he could, Ida's whole attention
by his persistent talk. He spoke to
no one else. If the princess or the
baron cut into the conversation,
he ignored each as if neither party ex-
listed; save when obliged to answer a
question directly addressed to him,
and then he answered in monosyIla-
BILE, and his voice was more like bears
growl than even before. If it were the
baron who spoke to him, on any SUBJ
ject independent of the matter in hand,
he contented himself with a reply that
put a stop to all such adj
vances, for this time, at least. He was
more unpleasant than could have been
believed, as the princess said in her
pretty broken English, and, SO far as he
could, he spoiled the days pleasure for
all concerned, anxious as he was to
punish all and sundry for the inffic-
ton of that undesired association. For
this, too, as for some other things, the
baron owed him, more than one; and
in his own mind resolved TO pay his
debt with interest. The only difficulty