Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. III.djvu/44

Rh in her clear, dark-brown eyes, diamond-like and still. It warmed me. We talked about Jane Eyre, and I, for the first time, heard any one openly express my own secret wishes with regard to Jane's behaviour to Rochester. I love that virtue which is above conventional morality, and which knows something better than to be merely—free from blame.

But I ought to tell you the cause of the interruption in my letter yesterday. First, it was the cold, and then it was the fire. I will explain. The day which succeeded that beautiful summer-day of which I have spoken was wretched weather, so cold, that it shook both soul and body, and made me so irritable and so out of humour, that I thanked my good fortune not to have slaves, and that I thus should not be excited to wreak my bad temper on them. Never, until I came into America, had I any experience of the power which the feelings of the body can have over the soul. God help the slave-owner and the slave in this variable climate, the penetrative atmosphere of which causes both body and soul to vibrate according to its temperature.

Well, I was frozen, but I had a fire in my large handsome room. Octavia Le V. came, and Mrs. G., for I had began to sketch their portraits in my album, and they were to sit to me.

I enjoyed the contemplation and the drawing of these two amiable ladies, the noble, earnest regular profile of Mrs. G., and the round, childlike, piquant countenance of Octavia Le V., with its little turned-up nose, which I imagine resembles Cleopatra's, and its fantastic arrangement of the hair, the artistic labour of Betsy's hands. We were very comfortable; Mrs. G. sat before the fire, Octavia before me, and we were talking earnestly and cheerfully about love, when a messenger came to Mrs. G. from her husband, requesting her to send her keys. St. Charles's hotel was on fire.