have moulded me according to her will. Now," and he struggled
with emotion, and turned away his face,--"now it is too late!"

Constance was smitten to the heart. She laid her hand gently on his arm,
and said, in a sweet and soothing tone, "No, Percy, not too late!"

At that instant, and before Godolphin could reply, they were joined by
Saville and Lady Charlotte Deerham.

(1) I suppose Godolphin by the word pleasure rather signifies happiness.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

LUCILLA'S LETTER.--THE EFFECT IT PRODUCES ON GODOLPHIN.

The short conversation recorded in the last chapter could not but show
to Godolphin the dangerous ground on which his fidelity to Lucilla
rested. Never before,--no, not in the young time of their first passion,
had Constance seemed to him so lovely or so worthy of love. Her manners
now were so much more soft and unreserved than they had necessarily been
at a period when Constance had resolved not to listen to his addresses
or her own heart, that the only part of her character that had ever
repulsed his pride or offended his tastes seemed vanished for ever. A
more subdued and gentle spirit had descended on her surpassing beauty,
and the change was of an order that Percy Godolphin could especially
appreciate. And the world, for which he owned reluctantly that she yet
lived too much, had, nevertheless, seemed rather to enlarge and animate
the natural nobleness of her mind, than to fritter it down to the
standard of its common votaries. When she spoke he delighted in, even
while he dissented from, the high and bold views which she conceived. He
loved her indignation of all that was mean and low-her passion for all
that was daring and exalted. Never was he cast down from the height
of the imaginative part of his love by hearing from her lips one petty
passion or one sordid desire; much about her was erroneous, but all was
lofty and generous--even in error. And the years that had divided them
had only taught him to feel more deeply how rare was the order of her
character, and how impossible it was ever to behold her like. All the
sentiments, faculties, emotions, which in his affection for Lucilla had
remained dormant, were excited into full play the moment he was in the
presence of Constance. She engrossed no petty portion--she demanded and
obtained the whole empire--of his soul. And against this empire he had
now to contend! Torn as he was by a thousand conflicting emotions, a
letter from Lucilla was