come to her. Do you wonder much she accepted it? I think it was not
strange.

That night after his offer (the night she had asked for in which to
decide, although she said to herself, with a bitter little shrug as she
made the request, "A woman who hesitates is lost"), as she lay awake
pondering the whole matter, she thought: "It can't be worse than it is,
and it won't be very long either way, I think. I can be faithful to him,
make and mend, dig and delve, if needs be, for his benefit, in return for
the honor he does me in giving me his name and protection. I shall expect
nothing, literally nothing, from him that wives usually demand. I, who
have borne for years with the caprice of school-girls, can surely bear the
humors of one man, especially when his name shields me from other sorts of
ills. I have rather plumed myself these last few months upon having
learned the depth of meaning and force of truth there is in that
expression from _Sartor Resartus_ I used to think so wicked: 'Say to
happiness, I can do without you--in self-renunciation life begins,' I can
try it now. I need not be a spaniel or fawn upon my lord, and yet I can
obey and honor, if he will let me, this man to whom I shall vow myself for
life. For life! Can I endure it all the years I may have to live an
unloved wife--so near and yet so far from him to whom I am bound? Will it
not be a death in life? Will it be better than this dead, cold monotony I
now bear? Better or worse? Ah, there's the rub! I can never hope to win
his faithful, abiding love. Even did use make me acceptable to him, I
could not trust its continuance. And yet who knows whether, if I try to
keep a pure life and an honest purpose to walk before him worthily every
day, I may not win from him at last a sort of respect and friendship that
will be next to love? I will some time let him know of the friends my
literary efforts have brought me. I know he will be proud of the judgment
that scholarly men, whose opinions he honors, have placed upon the