ween one church and another--always,
moreover, with pre-judgment in favour of her own.

But the external results of her liberty began to be of importance. She
came into frequent connection with her cousin Eleanor; she saw more
than hitherto of the Bradshaws' family life; she had business
transactions; she read newspapers; she progressed slowly towards some
practical acquaintance with the world.

Miriam knew the very moment when the thought of making great sacrifices
to build a new chapel for Bartles had first entered her mind. One of
her girl friends had just married, and was come to live in the
neighbourhood. The husband, Welland by name, was wealthier and of more
social importance than Mr. Baske had been; it soon became evident that
Mrs. Welland, who also aspired to prominence in religious life, would
be a formidable rival to the lady of Redbeck House. On the occasion of
some local meeting, Miriam felt this danger keenly; she went home in
dark mood, and the outcome of her brooding was the resolve in question.

She had not inherited all her husband's possessions; indeed, there fell
to her something less than half his personal estate. For a time, this
had not concerned her; now she was beginning to think of it
occasionally with discontent, followed by reproach of conscience. Like
reproach did she suffer for the jealousy and envy excited in her by
Mrs. Welland's arrival. A general uneasiness of mind was gradually
induced, and the chapel-building project, with singular confusion of
motives, represented to her at once a worldly ambition and a discipline
for the soul. It was a long time before she spoke of it, and in the
interval she suffered more and more from a vague mental unrest.

Letters were coming to her from Cecily. Less by what they contained
than by what they omitted, she knew that Cecily was undergoing a great
change. Miriam put at length certain definite questions, and the
answers she received were unsatisfactory, alarming. The correspondence
became a distinct source of trouble. Not merely on Cecily's account;
she was led by it to think of the world beyond her horizon, and to
conceive dissatisfactions such as had never taken form to her.

Her physical health began to fall off; she had seasons of depression,
during which there settled upon her superstitious fears. Ascetic
impulses returned, and by yielding to them she established a new cause
of bodily weakness. And the more she suffered, the more intolerable