aspect, with his half-reproachful glances toward herself, and with the
emotions which he had given vent to in their conversation. And of this
objectless and unsatisfactory life she was led to consider herself the
cause. With a bitter pang she recalled his early words, when he said, "My
future is in your hands;" and she contrasted his vivid energies--his
cultivated mind--his high talents--with the life which had rendered them
all so idle to others and unprofitable to himself. Few, very few, know
how powerfully the sentiment that another's happiness is at her control
speaks to a woman's heart. Accustomed to dependence herself, the feeling
that another depends on her is the most soothing aliment to her pride.
This makes a main cause of her love to her children; they would be
incomparably less dear to her if they were made independent of her cares.
And years, which had brought the young countess acquainted with the
nothingness of the world, had softened and deepened the sources of her
affections, in proportion as they had checked those of her ambition. She
could not, she did not, seek to disguise from herself that Godolphin yet
loved her; she anticipated the hour when he would avow that love, and when
she might be permitted to atone for all of disappointment that her former
rejection might have brought to him. She felt, too, that it would be a
noble as well as delightful task, to awaken an intellect so brilliant to
the natural objects of its display; to call forth into active life his
teeming thought, and the rich eloquence with which he could convey it.
Nor in this hope were her more selfish designs, her political schemings,
and her desire of sway over those whom she loved to humble, forgotten; but
they made, however,--to be just,--a small part of her meditations. Her
hopes were chiefly of a more generous order. "I refused thee," she
thought, "when I was poor and dependent--now that I have wealth and rank,
how gladly will I yield them to thy bidding!"

But Godolphin, as if unconscious of this favorable bias of her