discovered herself feeling as the burdened mother, not providently for
her girl, in the choice of a mate. The perception was clear, and not the
less did she continue working at the embroidery of Mr. Sowerby on the
basis of his excellent moral foundations, all the while hoping, praying,
that he might not be lured on to the proposal for Nesta. But her
subservience to the power of the persuasive will in Victor--which was
like the rush of a conflagration--compelled her to think realizingly of
any scheme he allowed her darkly to read.

Opposition to him, was comparable to the stand of blocks of timber before
flame. Colney Durance had done her the mischief we take from the
pessimist when we are overweighted: in darkening the vision of external
aid from man or circumstance to one who felt herself mastered. Victor
could make her treacherous to her wishes, in revolt against them, though
the heart protested. His first conquest of her was in her blood, to
weaken a spirit of resistance. For the precedent of submission is a
charm upon the faint-hearted through love: it unwinds, unwills them.
Nataly resolved fixedly, that there must be a day for speaking; and she
had her moral sustainment in the resolve; she had also a tormenting
consciousness of material support in the thought, that the day was not
present, was possibly distant, might never arrive. Would Victor's
release come sooner? And that was a prospect bearing resemblance to
hopes of the cure of a malady through a sharp operation.

These were matters going on behind the curtain; as wholly vital to her,
and with him at times almost as dominant, as the spiritual in memory,
when flesh has left but its shining track in dust of a soul outwritten;
and all their talk related to the purchase of furniture, the expeditions
to Lakelands, music, public affairs, the pardonable foibles of friends
created to amuse their fellows, operatic heroes and heroines, exhibitions