anity
into imagining that she could be of use in the world. She even smiled
in her solitude at the picture she drew of herself, reforming Ratcliffe,
and Krebs, and Schuyler Clinton. The ease with which Ratcliffe alone had
twisted her about his finger, now that she saw it, made her writhe, and
the thought of what he might have done, had she married him, and of
the endless succession of moral somersaults she would have had to turn,
chilled her with mortal terror. She had barely escaped being dragged
under the wheels of the machine, and so coming to an untimely end. When
she thought of this, she felt a mad passion to revenge herself on the
whole race of politicians, with Ratcliffe at their head; she passed
hours in framing bitter speeches to be made to his face.

Then as she grew calmer, Ratcliffe's sins took on a milder hue; life,
after all, had not been entirely blackened by his arts; there was even
some good in her experience, sharp though it were. Had she not come to
Washington in search of men who cast a shadow, and was not Ratcliffe's
shadow strong enough to satisfy her? Had she not penetrated the deepest
recesses of politics, and learned how easily the mere possession of
power could convert the shadow of a hobby-horse existing only in the
brain of a foolish country farmer, into a lurid nightmare that convulsed
the sleep of nations? The antics of Presidents and Senators had been
amusing--so amusing that she had nearly been persuaded to take part in
them. She had saved herself in time.

She had got to the bottom of this business of democratic government, and
found out that it was nothing more than government of any other kind.
She might have known it by her own common sense, but now that experience
had proved it, she was glad to quit the masquerade; to return to the
true democracy of life, her paupers and her prisons, her schools and her
hospitals. As for Mr. Ratcliffe, she felt no difficulty in dealing with
him.

Let Mr. Ratcliffe, and his brother giants, wander on their own political
prairie, and hunt for offices, or other profitable game, as they would.

Their objects were not her objects, and to join their company was not
her ambition. She was no longer very angry with Mr. Ratcliffe. She had
no wish to insult him, or to quarrel with him. What he had done as a
politician, he had done according to his own moral code, and it was not
her business to judge him; to protect herself was the only right she
claimed. She