overcome his avaricious propensities,
and made Elinor his wife, not to gratify a sensual passion, but the
terrible spirit of revenge.

Poor Elinor! For a long time her reason bowed before the knowledge of
these horrible facts, and when she did at last recover her senses, her
beauty had faded beneath the blight of sorrow like the brilliant but
evanescent glow of the evening cloud, which vanishes at the approach of
night. Weary of life, she did not regret the loss of those fatal charms
which had been to her a source of such misery.

The last time the rose tint ever visited her once blooming cheeks was
when suddenly informed by Mr. Hurdlestone of his brother's marriage with
a young lady of large fortune. "May he be happy," she exclaimed,
clasping her hands together, whilst the deepest crimson suffused her
face. "I was not worthy to be his wife!" Ere the sentence was concluded
the color had faded from her cheek, which no after emotion recalled.

His brother's marriage produced a strange effect upon the mind of Mark
Hurdlestone. It cheated him of a part of his revenge. He had expected
that the loss of Elinor would have stung Algernon to madness; that his
existence would have become insupportable without the woman he loved.
How great was his mortification when, neither by word nor letter, nor in
conversation with his friends, did his injured brother ever revert to
the subject! That Algernon did not feel the blow, could scarcely be
inferred from his silence. The grief he felt was too acute for words,
and Algernon was still too faithful to the object of his first ardent
attachment to upbraid her conduct to others. Mark, who could not
understand this delicacy of sentiment, concluded that Elinor was no
longer regarded with affection by her lover. Elinor comprehended his
silence better, and she loved him more intensely for his forbearance.

Algernon the world reputed rich and happy, and the Squire despised
Elinor when her person was no longer coveted by his rival. His temper,
constitutionally bad, became intolerable, and he treated his
uncomplaining wife with such unkindness, that it would have broken her
heart, if the remembrance of a deeper sorrow had not rendered her
indifferent to his praise or censure. She considered his kindest mercy
was neglect.

Having now no other passion to gratify but avarice, Mark Hurdlestone's
hoarding propensities returned with double force. He gradually
retrenched his domestic expenses; laid d