ng stricken by the
blows which had prostrated them both, all questions of love and marriage
had been put aside. Did she love him? She felt such a kind pity for
his misfortune, such an admiration for his generous gallantry, such a
remorse for her own wayward conduct and cruel behaviour towards this
most honest, and kindly, and affectionate gentleman, that the sum of
regard which she could bestow upon him might surely be said to amount
to love. For such a union as that contemplated between them, perhaps
for any marriage, no greater degree of attachment was necessary as the
common cement. Warm friendship and thorough esteem and confidence (I do
not say that our young lady calculated in this matter-of-fact way) are
safe properties invested in the prudent marriage stock, multiplying
and bearing an increasing value with every year. Many a young couple of
spendthrifts get through their capital of passion in the first twelve
months, and have no love left for the daily demands of after life. O me!
for the day when the bank account is closed, and the cupboard is empty,
and the firm of Damon and Phyllis insolvent!

Miss Newcome, we say, without doubt, did not make her calculations in
this debtor and creditor fashion; it was only the gentlemen of that
family who went to Lombard Street. But suppose she thought that regard,
and esteem, and, affection being sufficient, she could joyfully, and
with almost all her heart bring such a portion to Lord Kew; that her
harshness towards him as contrasted with his own generosity, and above
all with his present pain, infinitely touched her; and suppose she
fancied that there was another person in the world to whom, did fates
permit, she could offer not esteem, affection, pity only, but something
ten thousand times more precious? We are not in the young lady's
secrets, but if she has some as she sits by her father's chair and
bed, who day or night will have no other attendant; and, as she
busies herself to interpret his wants, silently moves on his errands,
administers his potions, and watches his sleep, thinks of Clive absent
and unhappy, of Kew wounded and in danger, she must have subject enough
of thought and pain. Little wonder that her cheeks are pale and her eyes
look red; she has her cares to endure now in the world, and her burden
to bear in it, and somehow she feels she is alone, since that day when
poor Clive's carriage drove away.

In a mood of more than ordinary depression and weakne