here, had at
first charmed him, was succeeded by the knowing conduct of a determined
follower of the fashions, and a decided woman of the world.

It had never struck the viscount as impossible that an artless and
innocent girl would fall in love with his faded and bilious face, but the
moment Catharine betrayed the arts of a manager, he saw at once the
artifice that had been practised; of course he ceased to love her.

Men are flattered for a season with notice that has been unsought, but it
never fails to injure the woman who practises it in the opinion of the
other sex, in time. Without a single feeling in common, without a regard
to anything but self, in either husband or wife, it could not but happen
that a separation must follow, or their days be spent in wrangling and
misery. Catharine willingly left her husband; her husband more willingly
got rid of her.

During all these movements the dowager had a difficult game to play. It
was unbecoming her to encourage the strife, and it was against her wishes
to suppress it; she therefore moralized with the peer, and frowned upon
her daughter.

The viscount listened to her truisms with the attention of a boy who is
told by a drunken father how wicked it is to love liquor, and heeded them
about as much; while Kate, mistress at all events of two thousand a year,
minded her mother's frowns as little as she regarded her smiles; both were
indifferent to her.

A few days after the ladies left Lisbon, the viscount proceeded to Italy
in company with the repudiated wife of a British naval officer; and if
Kate was not guilty of an offence of equal magnitude, it was more owing to
her mother's present vigilance than to her previous care.

The presence of Mrs. Wilson was a great source of consolation to Emily in
the absence of her husband; and as their longer abode in town was useless,
the countess declining to be presented without the earl, the whole family
decided upon a return into Northamptonshire.

The deanery had been furnished by order of Pendennyss immediately on his
marriage; and its mistress hastened to take possession of her new
dwelling. The amusement and occupation of this movement, the planning of
little improvements, her various duties under her increased
responsibilities, kept Emily from dwelling unduly upon the danger of her
husband. She sought out amongst the first objects of her bounty the
venerable peasant whose loss had been formerly supplied by Pendennyss on