Page:Romance & Reality 2.pdf/188

186 Edward Lorraine was seated at an open window: when the soft warm rain came down, it beat the other way, and the eye followed it driving through the sunshine, like a fairy shower of diamond or amber, till it seemed to melt on the green and distant hills into a mist, silvery but indistinct.

Mr. Morland was amusing himself with the County Chronicle, and Edward was absorbed in his book: Lady Mandeville and Emily were seated at a small work-table. Lady Mandeville, who had not been in the room ten minutes, was very industrious; but it must be owned that Emily's eye wandered more than once to the opposite window: Edward was so very intent on the page before him. At length he closed the volume—leant as if meditating on its contents, for a few minutes—and then rose and approached the work-table. Edward Lorraine.—"I am so fascinated with what I have been reading, that I am under the absolute necessity of talking about it:

Lady Mandeville.—"And we are to enjoy your happiness without knowing in what it consists: disinterested sympathy, at least."