him. The vision of the truthfulness of her nature threw a celestial wan
beam on her guilty destiny.

She patted his head and bade him leave her, narrowing her shoulders on
the breast to let it be seen that the dark household within was locked
and shuttered.

He went. He was good, obedient, humane; he was generous, exquisitely
bred; he brought her peace, and he had been warned. It is difficult in
affliction to think of one who belongs to us as one to whom we owe a
duty. The unquestionably sincere and devoted lover is also in his
candour a featureless person; and though we would not punish him for his
goodness, we have the right to anticipate that it will be equal to every
trial. Perhaps, for the sake of peace . . . after warning him . . .
her meditations tottered in dots.

But when the heart hungers behind such meditations, that thinking without
language is a dangerous habit; for there will suddenly come a dash
usurping the series of tentative dots, which is nothing other than the
dreadful thing resolved on, as of necessity, as naturally as the
adventurous bow-legged infant pitches back from an excursion of two paces
to mother's lap; and not much less innocently within the mind, it would
appear. The dash is a haven reached that would not be greeted if it
stood out in words. Could we live without ourselves letting our animal
do our thinking for us legibly? We live with ourselves agreeably so long
as his projects are phrased in his primitive tongue, even though we have
clearly apprehended what he means, and though we sufficiently well
understand the whither of our destination under his guidance. No counsel
can be saner than that the heart should be bidden to speak out in plain
verbal speech within us. For want of it, Clotilde's short explorations