Page:The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (emended first edition), Volume 3.djvu/89

Rh heart and affection, for the poor tenants of Grass-dale, and above all for my aunt—I will stay if I possibly can.

July 29th.—Mrs. Hargrave and her daughter are come back from London. Esther is full of her first season in town; but she is still heart-whole and unengaged. Her mother sought out an excellent match for her, and even brought the gentleman to lay his heart and fortune at her feet; but Esther had the audacity to refuse the noble gifts. He was a man of good family and large possessions, but the naughty girl maintained he was old as Adam, ugly as sin, and hateful asone who shall be nameless.

"But indeed, I had a hard time of it," said she: "mamma was very greatly disappointed at the failure of her darling project, and very, very angry at my obstinate resistance to her will,—and is so still; but I can't help it. And Walter, too, is so seriously displeased at my perversity and absurd caprice, as he calls it,