The social relations of the sex often make men villanous--they more often
make them weak.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

AN EVENING WITH CONSTANCE.

Constances's heart was in her eyes when she saw Godolphin that evening.
She had, it is true, as Saville observed, been compelled by common
courtesy to invite him; and although there was an embarrassment in their
meeting, who shall imagine that it did not bring to Constance more of
pleasure than pain? She had been deeply shocked by Lord Erpingham's
sudden death: they had not been congenial minds, but the great have an
advantage denied to the less wealthy orders. Among the former, a husband
and wife need not weary each other with constant companionships; different
establishments, different hours, different pursuits, allow them to pass
life in great measure apart, so that there is no necessity for hatred, and
indifference is the coldest feeling which custom induces.

Still in the prime of youth and at the zenith of her beauty, Constance was
now independent. She was in the enjoyment of the wealth and rank her
early habits of thought had deemed indispensable, and she now for the
first time possessed the power of sharing them with whom she pleased. At
this thought how naturally her heart flew back to Godolphin! And while
she now gazed, although by stealth, at his countenance, as he sat at a
little distance from her, and in his turn watched for the tokens of past
remembrance, she was deeply touched by the change (light as it seemed to
others) which years had brought to him; and in recalling the emotion he
had testified at meeting her, she suffered her heart to soften, while it
reproached her in whispering, "Thou art the cause!"--All the fire--the