December 20th, 1825. - Another year is past; and I am weary of thislife. And yet I cannot wish to leave it: whatever afflictionsassail me here, I cannot wish to go and leave my darling in thisdark and wicked world alone, without a friend to guide him throughits weary mazes, to warn him of its thousand snares, and guard himfrom the perils that beset him on every hand. I am not well fittedto be his only companion, I know; but there is no other to supplymy place. I am too grave to minister to his amusements and enterinto his infantile sports as a nurse or a mother ought to do, andoften his bursts of gleeful merriment trouble and alarm me; I seein them his father's spirit and temperament, and I tremble for theconsequences; and too often damp the innocent mirth I ought toshare. That father, on the contrary, has no weight of sadness onhis mind; is troubled with no fears, no scruples concerning hisson's future welfare; and at evenings especially, the times whenthe child sees him the most and the oftenest, he is alwaysparticularly jocund and open-hearted: ready to laugh and to jestwith anything or anybody but me, and I am particularly silent andsad: therefore, of course, the child dotes upon his seeminglyjoyous amusing, ever-indulgent papa, and will at any time gladlyexchange my company for his. This disturbs me greatly; not so muchfor the sake of my son's affection (though I do prize that highly,and though I feel it is my right, and know I have done much to earnit) as for that influence over him which, for his own advantage, Iwould strive to purchase and retain, and which for very spite hisfather delights to rob me of, and, from motives of mere idleegotism, is pleased to win to himself; making no use of it but totorment me and ruin the child. My only consolation is, that hespends comparatively little of his time at home, and, during themonths he passes in London or elsewhere, I have a chance ofrecovering the ground I had lost, and overcoming with good the evilhe has wrought by his wilful mismanagement. But then it is abitter trial to behold him, on his return, doing his utmost tosubvert my labours and transform my innocent, affectionate,tractable darling into a selfish, disobedient, and mischievous boy;thereby preparing the soil for those vices he has so successfullycultivated in his own perverted nature.

Happily, there were none of Arthur's 'friends' invited to Grassdalelast autumn: he took himself off to visit some of them instead. Iwish he would always do so, and I wish his friends were numerousand loving enough to keep him amongst them all the year round. Mr.Hargrave, considerably to my annoyance, did not go with him; but Ithink I have done with that gentleman at last.

For seven or eight months he behaved so remarkably well, andmanaged so skilfully too, that I was almost completely off myguard, and was really beginning to look upon him as a friend, andeven to treat him as such, with certain prudent restrictions (whichI deemed scarcely necessary); when, presuming upon my unsuspectingkindness, he thought he might venture to overstep the bounds ofdecent moderation and propriety that had so long restrained him.It was on a pleasant evening at the close of May: I was wanderingin the park, and he, on seeing me there as he rode past, made boldto enter and approach me, dismounting and leaving his horse at thegate. This was the first time he had ventured to come within itsinclosure since I had been left alone, without the sanction of hismother's or sister's company, or at least the excuse of a messagefrom them. But he managed to appear so calm and easy, sorespectful and self-possessed in his friendliness, that, though alittle surprised, I was neither alarmed nor offended at the unusualliberty, and he walked with me under the ash-trees and by thewater-side, and talked, with considerable animation, good taste,and intelligence, on many subjects, before I began to think aboutgetting rid of him. Then, after a pause, during which we bothstood gazing on the calm, blue water - I revolving in my mind thebest means of politely dismissing my companion, he, no doubt,pondering other matters equally alien to the sweet sights andsounds that alone were present to his senses, - he suddenlyelectrified me by beginning, in a peculiar tone, low, soft, butperfectly distinct, to pour forth the most unequivocal expressionsof earnest and passionate love; pleading his cause with all thebold yet artful eloquence he could summon to his aid. But I cutshort his appeal, and repulsed him so determinately, so decidedly,and with such a mixture of scornful indignation, tempered withcool, dispassionate sorrow and pity for his benighted mind, that hewithdrew, astonished, mortified, and discomforted; and, a few daysafter, I heard that he had departed for London. He returned,however, in eight or nine weeks, and did not entirely keep alooffrom me, but comported himself in so remarkable a manner that hisquick-sighted sister could not fail to notice the change.

'What have you done to Walter, Mrs. Huntingdon?' said she onemorning, when I had called at the Grove, and he had just left theroom after exchanging a few words of the coldest civility. 'He hasbeen so extremely ceremonious and stately of late, I can't imaginewhat it is all about, unless you have desperately offended him.Tell me what it is, that I may be your mediator, and make youfriends again.'

'I have done nothing willingly to offend him,' said I. 'If he isoffended, he can best tell you himself what it is about.'

'I'll ask him,' cried the giddy girl, springing up and putting herhead out of the window: 'he's only in the garden - Walter!'

'No, no, Esther! you will seriously displease me if you do; and Ishall leave you immediately, and not come again for months -perhaps years.'

'Did you call, Esther?' said her brother, approaching the windowfrom without.

'Yes; I wanted to ask you - '

'Good-morning, Esther,' said I, talking her hand and giving it asevere squeeze.

'To ask you,' continued she, 'to get me a rose for Mrs.Huntingdon.' He departed. 'Mrs. Huntingdon,' she exclaimed,turning to me and still holding me fast by the hand, 'I'm quiteshocked at you - you're just as angry, and distant, and cold as heis: and I'm determined you shall be as good friends as ever beforeyou go.'

'Esther, how can you be so rude!' cried Mrs. Hargrave, who wasseated gravely knitting in her easy-chair. 'Surely, you never willlearn to conduct yourself like a lady!'

'Well, mamma, you said yourself - ' But the young lady wassilenced by the uplifted finger of her mamma, accompanied with avery stern shake of the head.

'Isn't she cross?' whispered she to me; but, before I could add myshare of reproof, Mr. Hargrave reappeared at the window with abeautiful moss-rose in his hand.

'Here, Esther, I've brought you the rose,' said he, extending ittowards her.

'Give it her yourself, you blockhead!' cried she, recoiling with aspring from between us.

'Mrs. Huntingdon would rather receive it from you,' replied he, ina very serious tone, but lowering his voice that his mother mightnot hear. His sister took the rose and gave it to me.

'My brother's compliments, Mrs. Huntingdon, and he hopes you and hewill come to a better understanding by-and-by. Will that do,Walter?' added the saucy girl, turning to him and putting her armround his neck, as he stood leaning upon the sill of the window -'or should I have said that you are sorry you were so touchy? orthat you hope she will pardon your offence?'

'You silly girl! you don't know what you are talking about,'replied he gravely.

'Indeed I don't: for I'm quite in the dark!'

'Now, Esther,' interposed Mrs. Hargrave, who, if equally benightedon the subject of our estrangement, saw at least that her daughterwas behaving very improperly, 'I must insist upon your leaving theroom!'

'Pray don't, Mrs. Hargrave, for I'm going to leave it myself,' saidI, and immediately made my adieux.

About a week after Mr. Hargrave brought his sister to see me. Heconducted himself, at first, with his usual cold, distant, half-stately, half-melancholy, altogether injured air; but Esther madeno remark upon it this time: she had evidently been schooled intobetter manners. She talked to me, and laughed and romped withlittle Arthur, her loved and loving playmate. He, somewhat to mydiscomfort, enticed her from the room to have a run in the hall,and thence into the garden. I got up to stir the fire. Mr.Hargrave asked if I felt cold, and shut the door - a veryunseasonable piece of officiousness, for I had meditated followingthe noisy playfellows if they did not speedily return. He thentook the liberty of walking up to the fire himself, and asking meif I were aware that Mr. Huntingdon was now at the seat of LordLowborough, and likely to continue there some time.

'No; but it's no matter,' I answered carelessly; and if my cheekglowed like fire, it was rather at the question than theinformation it conveyed.

'You don't object to it?' he said.

'Not at all, if Lord Lowborough likes his company.'

'You have no love left for him, then?'

'Not the least.'

'I knew that - I knew you were too high-minded and pure in your ownnature to continue to regard one so utterly false and polluted withany feelings but those of indignation and scornful abhorrence!'

'Is he not your friend?' said I, turning my eyes from the fire tohis face, with perhaps a slight touch of those feelings he assignedto another.

'He was,' replied he, with the same calm gravity as before; 'but donot wrong me by supposing that I could continue my friendship andesteem to a man who could so infamously, so impiously forsake andinjure one so transcendently - well, I won't speak of it. But tellme, do you never think of revenge?'

'Revenge! No - what good would that do? - it would make him nobetter, and me no happier.'

'I don't know how to talk to you, Mrs. Huntingdon,' said he,smiling; 'you are only half a woman - your nature must be halfhuman, half angelic. Such goodness overawes me; I don't know whatto make of it.'

'Then, sir, I fear you must be very much worse than you should be,if I, a mere ordinary mortal, am, by your own confession, so vastlyyour superior; and since there exists so little sympathy betweenus, I think we had better each look out for some more congenialcompanion.' And forthwith moving to the window, I began to lookout for my little son and his gay young friend.

'No, I am the ordinary mortal, I maintain,' replied Mr. Hargrave.'I will not allow myself to be worse than my fellows; but you,Madam - I equally maintain there is nobody like you. But are youhappy?' he asked in a serious tone.

'As happy as some others, I suppose.'

'Are you as happy as you desire to be?'

'No one is so blest as that comes to on this side eternity.'

'One thing I know,' returned he, with a deep sad sigh; 'you areimmeasurably happier than I am.'

'I am very sorry for you, then,' I could not help replying.

'Are you, indeed? No, for if you were you would be glad to relieveme.'

'And so I should if I could do so without injuring myself or anyother.'

'And can you suppose that I should wish you to injure yourself?No: on the contrary, it is your own happiness I long for more thanmine. You are miserable now, Mrs. Huntingdon,' continued he,looking me boldly in the face. 'You do not complain, but I see -and feel - and know that you are miserable - and must remain so aslong as you keep those walls of impenetrable ice about your stillwarm and palpitating heart; and I am miserable, too. Deign tosmile on me and I am happy: trust me, and you shall be happy also,for if you are a woman I can make you so - and I will do it inspite of yourself!' he muttered between his teeth; 'and as forothers, the question is between ourselves alone: you cannot injureyour husband, you know, and no one else has any concern in thematter.'

'I have a son, Mr. Hargrave, and you have a mother,' said I,retiring from the window, whither he had followed me.

'They need not know,' he began; but before anything more could besaid on either side, Esther and Arthur re-entered the room. Theformer glanced at Walter's flushed, excited countenance, and thenat mine - a little flushed and excited too, I daresay, though fromfar different causes. She must have thought we had beenquarrelling desperately, and was evidently perplexed and disturbedat the circumstance; but she was too polite or too much afraid ofher brother's anger to refer to it. She seated herself on thesofa, and putting back her bright, golden ringlets, that werescattered in wild profusion over her face, she immediately began totalk about the garden and her little playfellow, and continued tochatter away in her usual strain till her brother summoned her todepart.

'If I have spoken too warmly, forgive me,' he murmured on takinghis leave, 'or I shall never forgive myself.' Esther smiled andglanced at me: I merely bowed, and her countenance fell. Shethought it a poor return for Walter's generous concession, and wasdisappointed in her friend. Poor child, she little knows the worldshe lives in!

Mr. Hargrave had not an opportunity of meeting me again in privatefor several weeks after this; but when he did meet me there wasless of pride and more of touching melancholy in his manner thanbefore. Oh, how he annoyed me! I was obliged at last almostentirely to remit my visits to the Grove, at the expense of deeplyoffending Mrs. Hargrave and seriously afflicting poor Esther, whoreally values my society for want of better, and who ought not tosuffer for the fault of her brother. But that indefatigable foewas not yet vanquished: he seemed to be always on the watch. Ifrequently saw him riding lingeringly past the premises, lookingsearchingly round him as he went - or, if I did not, Rachel did.That sharp-sighted woman soon guessed how matters stood between us,and descrying the enemy's movements from her elevation at thenursery-window, she would give me a quiet intimation if she saw mepreparing for a walk when she had reason to believe he was about,or to think it likely that he would meet or overtake me in the wayI meant to traverse. I would then defer my ramble, or confinemyself for that day to the park and gardens, or, if the proposedexcursion was a matter of importance, such as a visit to the sickor afflicted, I would take Rachel with me, and then I was nevermolested.

But one mild, sunshiny day, early in November, I had ventured forthalone to visit the village school and a few of the poor tenants,and on my return I was alarmed at the clatter of a horse's feetbehind me, approaching at a rapid, steady trot. There was no stileor gap at hand by which I could escape into the fields, so I walkedquietly on, saying to myself, 'It may not be he after all; and ifit is, and if he do annoy me, it shall be for the last time, I amdetermined, if there be power in words and looks against coolimpudence and mawkish sentimentality so inexhaustible as his.'

The horse soon overtook me, and was reined up close beside me. Itwas Mr. Hargrave. He greeted me with a smile intended to be softand melancholy, but his triumphant satisfaction at having caught meat last so shone through that it was quite a failure. Afterbriefly answering his salutation and inquiring after the ladies atthe Grove, I turned away and walked on; but he followed and kepthis horse at my side: it was evident he intended to be mycompanion all the way.

'Well! I don't much care. If you want another rebuff, take it -and welcome,' was my inward remark. 'Now, sir, what next?'

This question, though unspoken, was not long unanswered; after afew passing observations upon indifferent subjects, he began insolemn tones the following appeal to my humanity:-

'It will be four years next April since I first saw you, Mrs.Huntingdon - you may have forgotten the circumstance, but I nevercan. I admired you then most deeply, but I dared not love you. Inthe following autumn I saw so much of your perfections that I couldnot fail to love you, though I dared not show it. For upwards ofthree years I have endured a perfect martyrdom. From the anguishof suppressed emotions, intense and fruitless longings, silentsorrow, crushed hopes, and trampled affections, I have sufferedmore than I can tell, or you imagine - and you were the cause ofit, and not altogether the innocent cause. My youth is wastingaway; my prospects are darkened; my life is a desolate blank; Ihave no rest day or night: I am become a burden to myself andothers, and you might save me by a word - a glance, and will not doit - is this right?'

'In the first place, I don't believe you,' answered I; 'in thesecond, if you will be such a fool, I can't hinder it.'

'If you affect,' replied he, earnestly, 'to regard as folly thebest, the strongest, the most godlike impulses of our nature, Idon't believe you. I know you are not the heartless, icy being youpretend to be - you had a heart once, and gave it to your husband.When you found him utterly unworthy of the treasure, you reclaimedit; and you will not pretend that you loved that sensual, earthly-minded profligate so deeply, so devotedly, that you can never loveanother? I know that there are feelings in your nature that havenever yet been called forth; I know, too, that in your presentneglected lonely state you are and must be miserable. You have itin your power to raise two human beings from a state of actualsuffering to such unspeakable beatitude as only generous, noble,self-forgetting love can give (for you can love me if you will);you may tell me that you scorn and detest me, but, since you haveset me the example of plain speaking, I will answer that I do notbelieve you. But you will not do it! you choose rather to leave usmiserable; and you coolly tell me it is the will of God that weshould remain so. You may call this religion, but I call it wildfanaticism!'

'There is another life both for you and for me,' said I. 'If it bethe will of God that we should sow in tears now, it is only that wemay reap in joy hereafter. It is His will that we should notinjure others by the gratification of our own earthly passions; andyou have a mother, and sisters, and friends who would be seriouslyinjured by your disgrace; and I, too, have friends, whose peace ofmind shall never be sacrificed to my enjoyment, or yours either,with my consent; and if I were alone in the world, I have still myGod and my religion, and I would sooner die than disgrace mycalling and break my faith with heaven to obtain a few brief yearsof false and fleeting happiness - happiness sure to end in miseryeven here - for myself or any other!'

'There need be no disgrace, no misery or sacrifice in any quarter,'persisted he. 'I do not ask you to leave your home or defy theworld's opinion.' But I need not repeat all his arguments. Irefuted them to the best of my power; but that power wasprovokingly small, at the moment, for I was too much flurried withindignation - and even shame - that he should thus dare to addressme, to retain sufficient command of thought and language to enableme adequately to contend against his powerful sophistries.Finding, however, that he could not be silenced by reason, and evencovertly exulted in his seeming advantage, and ventured to deridethose assertions I had not the coolness to prove, I changed mycourse and tried another plan.

'Do you really love me?' said I, seriously, pausing and looking himcalmly in the face.

'Do I love you!' cried he.

'Truly?' I demanded.

His countenance brightened; he thought his triumph was at hand. Hecommenced a passionate protestation of the truth and fervour of hisattachment, which I cut short by another question:-

'But is it not a selfish love? Have you enough disinterestedaffection to enable you to sacrifice your own pleasure to mine?'

'I would give my life to serve you.'

'I don't want your life; but have you enough real sympathy for myafflictions to induce you to make an effort to relieve them, at therisk of a little discomfort to yourself?'

'Try me, and see.'

'If you have, never mention this subject again. You cannot recurto it in any way without doubling the weight of those sufferingsyou so feelingly deplore. I have nothing left me but the solace ofa good conscience and a hopeful trust in heaven, and you labourcontinually to rob me of these. If you persist, I must regard youas my deadliest foe.'

'But hear me a moment - '

'No, sir! You said you would give your life to serve me; I onlyask your silence on one particular point. I have spoken plainly;and what I say I mean. If you torment me in this way any more, Imust conclude that your protestations are entirely false, and thatyou hate me in your heart as fervently as you profess to love me!'

He bit his lip, and bent his eyes upon the ground in silence for awhile.

'Then I must leave you,' said he at length, looking steadily uponme, as if with the last hope of detecting some token ofirrepressible anguish or dismay awakened by those solemn words. 'Imust leave you. I cannot live here, and be for ever silent on theall-absorbing subject of my thoughts and wishes.'

'Formerly, I believe, you spent but little of your time at home,' Ianswered; 'it will do you no harm to absent yourself again, for awhile - if that be really necessary.'

'If that be really possible,' he muttered; 'and can you bid me goso coolly? Do you really wish it?'

'Most certainly I do. If you cannot see me without tormenting meas you have lately done, I would gladly say farewell and never seeyou more.'

He made no answer, but, bending from his horse, held out his handtowards me. I looked up at his face, and saw therein such a lookof genuine agony of soul, that, whether bitter disappointment, orwounded pride, or lingering love, or burning wrath were uppermost,I could not hesitate to put my hand in his as frankly as if I badea friend farewell. He grasped it very hard, and immediately putspurs to his horse and galloped away. Very soon after, I learnedthat he was gone to Paris, where he still is; and the longer hestays there the better for me.

I thank God for this deliverance!