and the gathering suffusion in
her large and thickly-fringed blue eyes attested, more than anything
besides, the prevailing weakness of which she had spoken.

"Ay, happy, Lucy! That is the word. You must not be permitted to choose
a lot in life, in which the chances are not in favor of your happiness."

"I look not for that now, Ralph," was her reply, and with such hopeless
despondency visible in her face as she spoke, that, with a deeper
interest, taking her hand, he again urged the request she had already so
recently denied.

"And why not, my sweet sister? Why should you not anticipate happiness
as well as the rest of us? Who has a better right to happiness than the
young, the gentle, the beautiful, the good?--and you are all of these,
Lucy! You have the charms--the richer and more lasting charms--which, in
the reflective mind, must always awaken admiration! You have animation,
talent, various and active--sentiment, the growth of truth, propriety,
and a lofty aim--no flippancy, no weak vanity--and a gentle beauty, that
woos while it warms."

Her face became very grave, as she drew back from him.

"Nay, my sweet Lucy! why do you repulse me? I speak nothing but the
truth."

"You mock me!--I pray you, mock me not. I have suffered much, Mr.
Colleton--very much, in the few last years of my life, from the sneer,
and the scorn, and the control of others! But I have been taught to hope
for different treatment, and a far gentler estimate. It is ill in you to
take up the speech of smaller spirits, and when the sufferer is one so
weak, so poor, so very wretched as I am now! I had not looked for such
scorn from you!"

Ralph was confounded. Was this caprice? He had never seen any proof of
the presence of such an infirmity in her. And yet, how could he account
for those strange words--that manner so full of offended pride? What had
he been saying? How had she misconceived him? He took her hand earnestly
in his own. She would have withdrawn it; but no!--he held it fast, and
looked pleadingly into her face, as he replied:--

"Surely, Lucy, you do me wrong! How could you think that I would design
to give you pain? Do you really estimate me by so low a standard, that
my voice, when it speaks in praise and homage, is held to be the voice
of vulgar flattery, and designing falsehood?"

"Oh, no, Ralph! not that--anything but that!"

"That I should sneer at _you_, Lucy--feel or utter scorn--_you_, to whom
I owe so much! Have I t