love and growing towards love surely, though repressed and thwarted.

Emilia read:

"So spake our general mother, and, with eyes
Of conjugal attraction unreproved,
And meek surrender, half-embracing leaned
On our first father; half her swelling breast
Naked met his, under the flowing gold
Of her loose tresses hid; he, in delight
Both of her beauty and submissive charms,
Smiled with superior love (as Jupiter
On Juno smiles, when he impregns the clouds
That shed May flowers), and pressed her matron lip
With kisses pure. Aside the Devil turned
For envy, yet with jealous leer malign
Eyed them askance; and to himself thus plained:--
'Sight hateful, sight tormenting!' . . ."

Molly interrupted with a cry; so fiercely Hetty had gripped her wrist
of a sudden. Emily broke off:

"What on earth's the matter, child?"

"Is it an adder?" asked Patty, whose mind was ever practical.
"Johnny Whitelamb warned us--"

"An adder?" Hetty answered her, cool in a moment and deliberate.
"Nothing like it, my dear; 'tis the old genuine Serpent."