"The more is the pity, (said Roseline;) therefore, my good mother, it would be unnecessary for me to consider any thing about the Baron's importance, since he thinks so much and so highly of it himself: but I do not see, for my part, why rank and fortune should tempt their possessors to assume so much on merely accidental advantages; or why people, distinguished as their favourites, should have a greater right to think and act as they please than those less fortunate. We were much happier and more cheerful before he came among us, and my father more indulgent."
"Your father (said Lady de Morney, with the utmost earnestness) is, I have no doubt, perfectly satisfied that he is acting right, and therefore you, Roseline, must be blameable in the presuming to call his conduct in question. I insist, as you value his and my favour, that you never again address me on this subject; and let me advise you, if you with to be happy, to shew no disgust to the Baron, but receive his attentions with politeness and good humour."
On saying this, she withdrew, and left Roseline, struck dumb with surprise, to form what conclusions she pleased. She knew not what to think from this unusually strange and unpleasant conversation, and could not comprehend either her father's or mother's reasons for being so much attached to any one, whatever might be his ranks, who was so little formed to excite any feelings but those of disgust in the minds of those unfortunate people who whom he condescended to associate. She saw and lamented that, since the Baron's arrival, neither De Clavering, De Willows, nor Hugh Camelford, came without a formal invitation from her father, while the reserve which prevailed in their parties banished all that enlivening conversation that once rendered them so pleasant. Her sisters too, the dear Edeliza, and the sweet Bertha, were kept under so much restraint before this great personage, they seemed almost afraid to speak.
Roseline, to shake off for a time these uncomfortable reflections, stole into the prisoner's room, in which she seldom failed to find her brother: there she lost all remembrance of the Baron; and, in conversing with friends so dear to her heart, progressively recovered that native cheerfulness which was one of the most engaging features of her character.—The sonnets, which her brother had so recently given her, not only served to raise her spirits, but had made an indelible impression on her mind. She smiled with something more than even her usual complacency on this love-taught poet. Of his tenderness and sincerity she could cherish no doubt. His honour and worth it was equally impossible to suspect. No one knew them better,—no one estimated them so highly as herself. To suppose he could be less amiable, less deserving of her attachment, would have appeared to her a crime of the most enormous magnitude. Thus did the fond effusions of love throw a veil over the eyes of their artless votary, in order to give a fair colouring, and to reconcile her to a conduct which, in another, her prudence would have taught her to condemn; but thus it is with too many erring mortals: when once they become the hood-winked slaves of any predominant passion, they are not only regardless of the world's opinion, but insensible to the secret admonitions of that silent monitor, which they carry in their bosom. Roseline as first acted merely from the generous impulse of pity and universal benevolence; but, in so doing, she admitted a guest to dispute with them a place in her breast, which neither time, reason, nor prudence, could banish thence.
Our artless heroine was unfortunately the darling child of sensibility, and her mind so susceptible of the miseries and misfortunes of others, that, from the moment she discovered them, they became her own. What then must be the poignancy of her feelings, when she reflected on the dependent, helpless, and unprovided state of a lover, dearer to her than life!—who dared not disclose even his name,—whose blameless conduct proved to her partial judgement that he suffered unjustly, and whose virtues could alone reconcile her to herself for having risked so much on his account, and entrusted her heart to the keeping of one whose situation precluded hope,—who had declared he belonged to no one,—a prisoner, a stranger, without fortune or friends: yet, think as she would, these cruel circumstances, after the strictest investigation, acted as a talisman in favour of her lover.
The life, which she fancied, under Providence, she had been the humble means of preserving, she concluded it was now her duty to render happy; therefore, to deprive it of its value, by affecting an indifference she did not feel, was as far from her power as her inclination; yet there were moments when she recollected, with the severest anguish, how much her brother, as well as herself, was acting in opposition to the designs and will of her parent. To deceive such parents was a thought which, in her most impassioned moments, she could not dwell upon, but love and sensibility had woven their webs so close around her heart, that she struggled in vain to disentangle herself from the bewitching snare.
Sensibility I have long thought, nine times out of ten, proves a source of misery to the generous and benevolent, and as often is merely the boast of the ignorant, who pretend to be overstocked with the milk of human kindness, and whose feelings are equally excited by the death of a husband or a lap-dog. I am satisfied there is no blessing more earnestly to be wished for than a calm and composed resignation to the events of this life, and all its complicated concerns.—It appears rather an Irishism, that to be happy we must become indifferent,—but so it is.
Real sensibility is of all burthens the heaviest to bear. Long experience and careful observation have convinced me too painfully of this truth. A thousand and a thousand times I have shed torrents of tears, and felt the most tormenting anxiety for those who would have seen me with the most stoical apathy begging through the street for bread. The pleasures attending high-raised sensibility are so much over-balanced by the painful effects they produce, that I protest I had rather be an oak, or a cabbage, than alive to such every-varying and corrosive feelings, which act upon the human mind as slow poison would upon the body.
When Roseline was going to bed, the servant who attended her, and who, from having lived some years in the family, was indulged in the habit of conversing familiarly with the young ladies, determined to get rid of a kind of confidential secret, which had been entrusted to her by one of her fellow-servants.
"Laws, Miss Roseline, (said she,) what think you that frightful old Baron comed here for?—As I live I should not have dreamed of any thing so ludicurst!"—