Page:Romance & Reality 3.pdf/91

Rh papers. In short—to be mythological in my conclusion—the quiver of Cupid hangs at the girdle of Fate together with her spindle and scissors. Beatrice had, even in her short and active life, perhaps dreamed of a lover. What Spanish girl, whose lute was familiar with all the romantic regions of her own romantic land, but must have had some such dream haunt her twilight? And for the matter of that, what girl, Spanish or English, has not? But Beatrice was too unworldly to dream of conquest—too proud to fear for her heart—and too much accustomed to idealise a lover amid the Paladins of olden time, to associate the young Englishman with other ideas than a claim to hospitality, and a vague hope of assistance. She was now to turn over a new leaf in the book of life—to learn woman's most important lesson—that of love. Not one person in a thousand is capable of a real passion—that intense and overwhelming feeling, before which all others sink into nothingness. It asks for head and heart—now many are deficient in both. Idleness and vanity cause, in nine cases out of ten, that state of excitement which is called being in love. I