train at the end of
their short tether, exciting only ridicule by their anguish and their
impotent impatience; or, sullen and despondent, they remain on the
ground, without any attempt to fly, nor creep, even to the full limit
which their fetters will allow. Thus it is with the feelings of the
keen, wild nature I speak of: they are either striving forever to pass
the little circle of slavery to which they are condemned, and so move
laughter by an excess of action and a want of adequate power; or they
rest motionless and moody, disdaining the petty indulgence they _might_
enjoy, till sullenness is construed into resignation, and despair seems
the apathy of content. Time, however, cures what it does not kill; and
both bird and beast, if they pine not to the death at first, grow tame
and acquiescent at last.

What to me was the companionship of Tarleton, or the attachment of
Lady Hasselton? I had yielded to the one, and I had half eagerly, half
scornfully, sought the other. These, and the avocations they brought
with them, consumed my time, and of Time murdered there is a ghost which
we term _ennui_. The hauntings of this spectre are the especial curse
of the higher orders; and hence springs a certain consequence to the
passions. Persons in those ranks of society so exposed to _ennui_ are
either rendered totally incapable of real love, or they love far more
intensely than those in a lower station; for the affections in them are
either utterly frittered away on a thousand petty objects (poor shifts
to escape the persecuting spectre), or else, early disgusted with the
worthlessness of these objects, the heart turns within and languishes
for something not found in the daily routine of life. When this is the
case, and when the pining of the heart is once satisfied, and the object
of love is found, there are two mighty reasons why the love should be
most passionately cherished. The first is, the utter indolence in
which aristocratic life oozes away, and which allows full food for that
meditation which can nurse by sure degrees the weakest desire into the
strongest passion; and the second reason is, that the insipidity and
hollowness of all patrician pursuits and pleasures render the excitement
of love more delicious and more necessary to the "_ignavi terrarum
domini_," than it is to those orders of society more usefully, more
constantly, and more engrossingly engaged.

Wearied and sated with the pursuit of what was worthless,