es. She declined
to give her reasons.--These bookworm women, whose pride it is to fancy
that they can think for themselves, have a great deal of the heathen in
them, as morality discovers when it wears the enlistment ribands and
applies yo them to win recruits for a service under the direct blessing
of Providence.

Lady Wathin left some darts behind her, in the form of moral
exclamations; and really intended morally. For though she did not like
Mrs. Warwick, she had no wish to wound, other than by stopping her
further studies of the Young Minister, and conducting him to the young
lady loving him, besides restoring a bereft husband to his own. How sadly
pale and worn poor Mr. Warwick appeared? The portrayal of his withered
visage to Lady Dunstane had quite failed to gain a show of sympathy. And
so it is ever with your book-worm women pretending to be philosophical!
You sound them vainly for a manifestation of the commonest human
sensibilities, They turn over the leaves of a Latin book on their laps
while you are supplicating them to assist in a work of charity!

Lady Wathin's interjectory notes haunted Emma's ear. Yet she had seen
nothing in Tony to let her suppose that there was trouble of her heart
below the surface; and her Tony when she came to Copsley shone in the
mood of the day of Lord Dannisburgh's drive down from London with her.
She was running on a fresh work; talked of composition as a trifle.

'I suppose the YOUNG MINISTER is Mr. Percy Dacier?' said Emma.

'Between ourselves he is,' Diana replied, smiling at a secret guessed.
'You know my model and can judge of the likeness.'

'You write admiringly of him, Tony.'

'And I do admire him. So would you, Emmy, if you knew him as well as I do
now. He pairs with Mr. Redworth; he also is the friend of women. But he
lifts us to rather a higher level of intellectual friendship. When the
ice has melted--and it is thick at first--he pours forth all his ideas
without reserve; and they are deep and noble. Ever since Lord
Dannisburgh's death and our sitting together, we have been warm
friends--intimate, I would say, if it could be said of one so
self-contained. In that respect, no young man was ever comparable with
him. And I am encouraged to flatter myself that he unbends to me more
than to others.'

'He is engaged, or partly, I hear; why does he not marry?'

'I wish he would!' Diana said, with a most brilliant candour of aspect.

Emma read in it, that it would