and. She is called upon to marry for love, and if she marry
not for love, she disobeys the ordinance of nature and must pay the
penalty. But at the same time all her material fortune depends upon
the nature of that love. An industrious man may marry a silly fretful
woman, and may be triumphant in his counting-house though he be
bankrupt in his drawing-room. But a woman has but the one chance.
She must choose her life's companion because she loves him; but she
knows how great is the ruin of loving one who cannot win for her that
worldly success which all in the world desire to win.

With Maryanne Brown these considerations had become frightfully
momentous. She had in her way felt the desire for some romance in
life, but she had felt more strongly still how needful it was that
she should attain by her feminine charms a position which would put
her above want. "As long as I have a morsel, you shall have half of
it," her father had said to her more than once. And she had answered
him with terrible harshness, "But what am I to do when you have no
longer a morsel to share with me? When you are ruined, or dead, where
must I then look for support and shelter?" The words were harsh, and
she was a very Regan to utter them. But, nevertheless, they were
natural. It was manifest enough that her father would not provide
for her, and for her there was nothing but Eve's lot of finding an
Adam who would dig for her support. She was hard, coarse,--almost
heartless; but it may perhaps be urged in her favour, that she was
not wilfully dishonest. She had been promised to one man, and though
she did not love him she would have married him, intending to do her
duty. But to this he would not consent, except under certain money
circumstances which she could not command. Then she learned to love
another man, and him she would have married; but prudence told her
that she should not do so until he had a home in which to place her.
And thus she fell to the ground between two stools, and, falling,
perceived that there was nothing before her on which her eye could
rest with satisfaction.

There are women, very many women, who could bear this, if with
sadness, still without bitterness. It is a lot which many women have
to bear; but Maryanne Brown was one within whose bosom all feelings
were turned to gall by the prospect of such a destiny. What had she
done to deserve such degradation and misfortune? She would have been
an honest wife to either husb