"The lives of St. Augustine, St. Jerome, and many more are as well authenticated as the Norman conquest," Mary said; "and those whose careers are most mysterious experienced nothing which is incomprehensible to any one who studies interior life, and knows the capacities of his own soul for receiving supernatural graces."
"The capacities of my soul are extremely limited, I think," replied Lady Sackvil. "Like you, I found my impressions on practical facts, not on metaphysics; so that our argument is at an end, I suppose."
"Apparently," said Mary good-humoredly. "I've not heard the piano lately. Why is that?"
"I am tired to death of playing," said Lady Sackvil; "at times it is an unutterable bore. For a composer it is, of course, different. The exercise of the creative faculty must be simply rapture; but mere interpretation palls frightfully at times."
"Is there no new music to interest you?"
"Very seldom. I am familiar with the whole range of musical literature. Don't look at me as if I were a wonder. It's no great thing for a well-trained musician to say. Musical literature, as compared with the world of books, is very limited. The present age is idle and unproductive; and so there come times when I shut the piano and feel that my 'occupation's gone.'"
She rose, and going gently to the cradle, knelt down beside it to watch the sleeping child. A tenderness came over her face, before so full of weariness and pain.
"I would have been a different woman if I had been a mother," she said, looking up at Mary with tears in her eyes. "Love of children and vanity are the only traits I have," she added, smiling sadly.
Mary made no answer, but looked at the tossed, selfish, whimsical being before her with an interest she had not felt hitherto.
"Isn't it heavenly sweet to have a child?" asked Amelia; "to hold that creature close to you, and feel that it is your own as your heart is your own?"