evoting his time to the back drawing-room in Dr. Stanhope's house.
He knew that what took place there would, if divulged, utterly ruin
him with Mrs. Bold. He knew that scandal would soon come upon his
heels and spread abroad among the black coats of Barchester some
tidings, exaggerated tidings, of the sighs which he poured into
the lady's ears. He knew that he was acting against the recognized
principles of his life, against those laws of conduct by which he
hoped to achieve much higher success. But, as we have said, he could
not help himself. Passion, for the first time in his life, passion
was too strong for him.

As for the signora, no such plea can be put forward for her, for in
truth she cared no more for Mr. Slope than she did for twenty others
who had been at her feet before him. She willingly, nay greedily,
accepted his homage. He was the finest fly that Barchester had
hitherto afforded to her web, and the signora was a powerful spider
that made wondrous webs, and could in no way live without catching
flies. Her taste in this respect was abominable, for she had no use
for the victims when caught. She could not eat them matrimonially,
as young lady flies do whose webs are most frequently of their
mothers' weaving. Nor could she devour them by any escapade of a
less legitimate description. Her unfortunate affliction precluded
her from all hope of levanting with a lover. It would be impossible
to run away with a lady who required three servants to move her from
a sofa.

The signora was subdued by no passion. Her time for love was gone.
She had lived out her heart, such heart as she had ever had, in her
early years, at an age when Mr. Slope was thinking of the second book
of Euclid and his unpaid bill at the buttery hatch. In age the lady
was younger than the gentleman, but in feelings, in knowledge of the
affairs of love, in intrigue, he was immeasurably her junior. It
was necessary to her to have some man at her feet. It was the one
customary excitement of her life. She delighted in the exercise of
power which this gave her; it was now nearly the only food for her
ambition; she would boast to her sister that she could make a fool
of any man, and the sister, as little imbued with feminine delicacy
as herself, good-naturedly thought it but fair that such amusement
should be afforded to a poor invalid who was debarred from the
ordinary pleasures of life.

Mr. Slope was madly in love but hardly knew it. The Signor