t for, though not excuse, much
folly and sin. They see others happy all around them: it is hard to fast
when so many are feasting. So there comes a shameful sense of
ignorance--a vague, eager desire for knowledge--a terror of an isolation
deepening and darkening upon them, and a determination, at any risks, to
balk at least _that_ enemy--and so, like the poor lady of Shalott, they
grow restless, and reckless, and rebellious at last. They are safe where
they are, but the days have so much of dull sameness that there is a
sore temptation in the unknown peril. "Better," they say, "than the
close atmosphere of the guarded castle and the phantasms of fairy-land,
one draught of the fresh outer air--one glimpse of real life and
nature--one taste of substantial joys and sorrows that shall wake all
the pulses of womanhood, even though the experience be brief and dearly
bought, though the web woven while we sat dreaming must surely be rent
in twain--ay, even though the curse, too, may follow very swiftly, and
the swans be waiting at the gate that shall bear us down to our
burying."

If staid and cold-blooded virgins and matrons are not exempt from these
disagreeable self-reproaches, how did it fare with Cecil Tresilyan, in
whom the energy of a strong temperament was stirring like the spring-sap
in a young oak-tree? Should she die conscious of the possession of such
a wealth of love, with none to share or inherit it? She had seen such
numbers of her friends and acquaintance "pair off," that she began to
envy at last the facility of attachment that she had been wont to hold
in scorn. Very many reflections of "lovers lately wed" had been cast
upon her mirror, and yet the One knightly shadow was long in coming. Can
it be that yonder gleam through the trees is the flash of his distant
armor?

I hope this illustrated edition of rather an old theory has not bored
you much; because it would have been just as simple to have said at once
that, as the days went on in Dorade, and they were thrown constantly
into each other's society, Major Keene began to monopolize much more of
Cecil Tresilyan's thoughts than she would have allowed if she could have
helped it; for, though she considered Mr. Fullarton's testimony unfairly
biased by prejudice, she could not doubt that Royston was by no means
the most eligible object to centre her young affections upon. He
carefully avoided discussion or display of any of his peculiar opinions
in her presence