Page:Vanity Fair 1848.djvu/525

 as the mother breaks her heart. By heavens it is pitiful, the bootless love of women for children in Vanity Fair.

A few days are past: and the great event of Amelia's life is consummated. No angel has intervened. The child is sacrificed and offered up to fate: and the widow is quite alone.

The boy comes to see her often, to be sure. He rides on a poney with the coachman behind him, to the delight of his old grandfather, Sedley, who walks proudly down the lane by his side. She sees him, but he is not her boy any more. Why, he rides to see the boys at the little school, too, and to show off before them his new wealth and splendour. In two days he has adopted a slight imperious air and patronising manner. He was born to command, his mother thinks, as his father was before him.



It is fine weather now. Of evenings on the days when he does not come, she takes a long walk into London—yes, as far as Russell-square, and rests on the stone by the railing of the garden opposite Mr. Osborne's