as better
remembered.

I discovered that there was little love between him and Alice. I never
heard from either an expression denoting that each felt an interest
in the other's individual life; neither was there any of that conjugal
freemasonry which bores one so to witness. But Alice was not unhappy.
Her ideas of love ended with marriage; what came afterward--children,
housekeeping, and the claims of society--sufficed her needs. If she
had any surplus of feeling it was expended upon her children, who had
much from her already, for she was devoted and indulgent to them.
In their management she allowed no interference, on this point only
thwarting her husband. In one respect she and Charles harmonized; both
were worldly, and in all the material of living there was sympathy.
Their relation was no unhappiness to him; he thought, I dare say,
if he thought at all, that it was a natural one. The men of his
acquaintance called him a lucky man, for Alice was handsome,
kind-hearted, intelligent, and popular.

Whether Cousin Alice would have found it difficult to fulfill
the promise she made mother regarding me, if I had been a plain,
unnoticeable girl, I cannot say, or whether her anxiety that I should
make an agreeable impression would have continued beyond a few days.
She looked after my dress and my acquaintances. When she found that
I was sought by the young people of her set and the Academy, she was
gratified, and opened her house for them, giving little parties and
large ones, which were pleasant to everybody except Cousin Charles,
who detested company--"it made him lie so." But he was very well
satisfied that people should like to visit and praise his house and
its belongings, if Alice would take the trouble of it upon herself. I
made calls with her Wednesday afternoons, and went to church with
her Sunday mornings. At home I saw little of her. She was almost
exclusively occupied with the children--their ailments or their
pleasures--and staid in her own room, or the nursery.

When in the house I never occupied one spot long, but wandered in the
garden, which had a row of elms, or haunted the kitchen and stables,
to watch black Phoebe, the cook, or the men as they cleaned the horses
or carriages. My own room was in a wing of the cottage, with a window
overlooking the entrance into the yard and the carriage drive; this
was its sole view, except the wall of a house on the other side of a
high fence. I heard Charles when h