en to kiss her feet, and I said indifferently: 'Not
pleading, only it is evident the claims--I hate myself for bringing
you in antagonism with them. Yes, and I have been learning some worldly
wisdom; I wish for your sake it had not been so late. What made me
overleap the proper estimate of your rank! I can't tell; but now that I
know better the kind of creature--the man who won your esteem when you
knew less of the world!'--

'Hush! I have an interest in him, and do not suffer him to be spurned,'
Ottilia checked me. 'I, too, know him better, and still, if he is
dragged down I am in the dust; if he is abused the shame is mine.' Her
face bloomed.

Her sweet warmth of colour was transfused through my veins.

'We shall part in a few minutes. I have a mind to beg a gift of you.'

'Name it.'

'That glove.'

She made her hand bare and gave me, not the glove, but the hand.

'Ah! but this I cannot keep.'

'Will you have everything spoken?' she said, in a tone that would have
been reproachful had not tenderness melted it. 'There should be a spirit
between us, Harry, to spare the task. You do keep it, if you choose.
I have some little dread of being taken for a madwoman, and more--an
actual horror of behaving ungratefully to my generous father. He has
proved that he can be indulgent, most trusting and considerate for his
daughter, though he is a prince; my duty is to show him that I do not
forget I am a princess. I owe my rank allegiance when he forgets his
on my behalf, my friend! You are young. None but an inexperienced girl
hoodwinked by her tricks of intuition, would have dreamed you superior
to the passions of other men. I was blind; I am regretful--take my word
as you do my hand--for no one's sake but my father's. You and I are
bound fast; only, help me that the blow may be lighter for him; if I
descend from the place I was born to, let me tell him it is to occupy
one I am fitted for, or should not at least feel my Family's deep blush
in filling. To be in the midst of life in your foremost England is, in
my imagination, very glorious. Harry, I remember picturing to myself
when I reflected upon your country's history--perhaps a year after I had
seen the two "young English gentlemen," that you touch the morning and
evening star, and wear them in your coronet, and walk with the sun West
and East! Child's imagery; but the impression does not wear off. If I
rail at England, it is the anger of love. I fancy I have good an