Page:Romance & Reality 1.pdf/313

Rh —how many a young and beating heart would show disappointment graven on the inmost core!—what a history of vain hopes, gentle endeavours, anxieties, and mortifications, laid bare! There is one phrase continually occurring in conversation,—"O, a woman never marries the man to whom she was first attached." How often—how lightly is this said!—how little thought given to the world of suffering it involves! Checked by circumstance—abandoned from necessity, the early attachment may depart with the early enthusiasm which youth brings, but leaves not; still the dream was sweet, and its waking bitter. But Emily was not one to whom such vision could be

Nature had given her the keenest sensibility; and the solitude in which much of her life had hitherto been passed had left free scope for the imagination to spiritualise and exalt. Living entirely with her uncle and aunt, she had insensibly caught the quiet manners of these, much advanced in life,—the young are great imitators. Unaccustomed to witness strong bursts of feeling, she never thought of giving