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400 BIGHT OR WRONG.
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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_ -«» *• ( Concluded From Page 339.)
hard , cold reasoning at the moment , but lie will soon acknowledge liow rightly I have decided ; in his own heart he may perhaps think
so now , _Lnt he is too high-minded to acquiesce till he is convinced I acted froni no sudden impulse , and that I shall never wish to recall
niy resolution . ' "' Ah , if he knew , if he knew , ' she sobbed , ' how he would
despise me !' " ' But lie never will know . Even you and I must forget all that ,
we will set it down amongst the dim wild visions of my fever , we must not speak of such things more ! We will talk instead
of bright days to come , "when—do not start , Alice ! it is no new thought of inine—when I shall dwell among nay loved ones ,
and smile io think their happiness is my work . ' " I spoke thus sanguinely to encourage her , I myself had no idea
of permanently recovering . I was feverishly excited ; I wonder now that I did not have a relapse . I felt all at once much stronger ,
nxy brain more active . An earnest desire to forward what I had in hand , an impatience of every delay in the accomplishment of my
task , had suddenly taken the place of the listless dreamy state in which the first three or four weeks of my tedious convalescence had
been passed . '' Ere long I obtained permission to see Eustace , having previously
conveyed to him an entreaty that he would forbear all allusion to the past , thus defining as I thought on what footing our future
intercourse was to be carried on . In his evident distress at my altered aspect , in the shock which the first sight of me occasioned ,
I saw plainly that all traces of the anger with which he had parted from me were effaced ; but , accustomed to study his every look and
tone , I discerned at the same time , notwithstanding the compassionate solicitude , the fraternal kindliness of his manner— -nay in these ,
through these , rather—that my apparent coldness and inconsistency had done their work ; that the idol had fallen from its pedestal , and
the Anne of former days had ceased to be . " I was in a strange mood then , I Lave not words to define it . I
do not say that the conviction of his changed feelings , though brought about by my own act , did not give me pain , but yet I suffered far
less than before or afterwards I could have deemed possible . I looked upon it all as soon to cease : I had the most firm persuasion
I was sinking into a decline , and that the singular reaction which made my voice strong , my memory clear , my eye bright , was but
the last nicker in the decaying lamp , warning me to set my house in order and prepare to die .
" With unutterable longing , I contemplated the approach of death ; my only _remaining link to earth was the intense desire to secure the
happiness of those two beings , who , present or absent , never ceased to occupy my thoughts .
" They were not much with me ; it was too like old times ,
Margaret ! I "used to say that the sound of voices fatigued me after a
400 Bight Or Wrong.
400 BIGHT OR WRONG .
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Aug. 1, 1859, page 400, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01081859/page/40/
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