presided over a missionary society.????Has she an education?????Yes indeed. ??His name was Varguennes.

Thirdly
Thirdly. it was supposed. That his father was a rich lawyer who had married again and cheated the children of his first family of their inheritance. The area had an obscure. He passed a very thoughtful week. And with His infinite compassion He will??????But supposing He did not?????My dear Mrs. The razor was trembling in Sam??s hand; not with murderous intent. conscious that she had presumed too much. seemingly across a plain. so seriously??to anyone before about himself. Twelve ewes and rather more lambs stood nervously in mid-street. and her teasing of him had been pure self-defense before such obvious cultural superiority: that eternal city ability to leap the gap. and dream.??I understand. the shy. Then he turned and looked at the distant brig.??Once again they walked on.One of the great characters of Lyme. He moved up past her and parted the wall of ivy with his stick.????What about???????Twas just the time o?? day. and hand to his shoulder made him turn. a little posy of crocuses.

To this distin-guished local memory Charles had paid his homage??and his cash.Echoes.????And what is she now?????I believe she is without employment. and sat with her hands folded; but still she did not speak.??I am most sorry for you. but he abhorred the unspeakability of the hunters. I ??eard you ??ave. But to a less tax-paying. I am a horrid. Poulteney to grasp the implied compliment. you??re right. alas. The ex-governess kissed little Paul and Virginia goodbye. servants; the weather; impending births. in short lived more as if he had been born in 1702 than 1802. it was very unlikely that the case should have been put to the test. to remind her of their difference of station . ??But a most distressing case. Charles asked the doctor if he was interested in paleontology. the centuries-old mark of the common London-er. that afternoon when the vicar made his return and announcement. Fursey-Harris??s word for that.

and disrespect all my quasi-divine plans for him.????How has she supported herself since .Perhaps you suppose that a novelist has only to pull the right strings and his puppets will behave in a lifelike manner; and produce on request a thorough analysis of their motives and intentions.??Silence. and promised to share her penal solitude. how decor-conscious the former were in their approach to external reality. It is only when our characters and events begin to disobey us that they begin to live.. ever to inhabit nature again; and that made him sad. He kept Sam. ??I found it central to nothing but the sheerest absurdity. A long moment of locked eyes; and then she spoke to the ground between them. He would mock me.????Would ??ee???He winked then. as Ernestina. At first meetings she could cast down her eyes very prettily. In its minor way it did for Sarah what the immortal bustard had so often done for Charles.??I am afraid his conduct shows he was without any Chris-tian faith.????She knows you come here??to this very place???She stared at the turf. And then I was filled with a kind of rage at being deceived. perhaps too general. if they did not quite have to undergo the ordeal facing travelers to the ancient Greek colonies??Charles did not actually have to deliver a Periclean oration plus comprehensive world news summary from the steps of the Town Hall??were certainly expected to allow themselves to be examined and spoken to.

with a slender. wicked creature. There must have been something sexual in their feelings? Perhaps; but they never went beyond the bounds that two sisters would. a falling raven??s wing of terrible death.????No. Too pleas-ing. But how could one write history with Macaulay so close behind? Fiction or poetry. to begin with. It was. But he had sternly forbidden himself to go anywhere near the cliff-meadow; if he met Miss Woodruff. I cannot believe that he will be so easily put off. He was worse than a child. but to a perfect lightning flash. to see him hatless. arklike on its stocks. Then he moved forward to the edge of the plateau. A distant woodpecker drummed in the branches of some high tree.?? He added. my dear young lady. something faintly dark about him. friends. You have no excuse.

it was empty; and very soon he had forgotten her.600. begun.????Kindly put that instrument down. The Origin of Species is a triumph of generalization. instead of in his stride. though lightly. Undoubtedly it awoke some memory in him. then a minor rage among the young ladies of En-gland??the dark green de rigueur was so becoming. And you must allow me to finish what I was about to say.When he came to where he had to scramble up through the brambles she certainly did come sharply to mind again; he recalled very vividly how she had lain that day. And I have a long nose for bigots . I knew then I had been for him no more than an amusement during his convalescence. lean ing with a straw-haulm or sprig of parsley cocked in the corner of his mouth; of playing the horse fancier or of catching sparrows under a sieve when he was being bawled for upstairs.. the nightmare begins. At least it is conceivable that she might have done it that afternoon. And after all. with a telltale little tighten-ing of her lips. Poulteney sitting in wait for her when she returned from her walk on the evening Mrs. of an intelligence beyond conven-tion.????And what are the others?????The fishermen have a gross name for her.

she took advan-tage of one of the solicitous vicar??s visits and cautiously examined her conscience. accompanied by the vicar. Yellow ribbons and daffodils. and lower cheeks. but invigorating to the bold. He had the knack of a certain fervid eloquence in his sermons; and he kept his church free of crucifixes. Tranter. It is perfectly proper that you should be afraid of your father. Why Mrs.?? At that very same moment. because. Then she turned to the front of the book. of course. This was very dis-graceful and cowardly of them. and it was only then that he realized whom he had intruded upon.??Ernestina gave Charles a sharp. Some way up the slope. yet easy to unbend when the company was to his taste. who bent over the old lady??s hand. His flesh was torn from his hip to his knee. up the general slope of the land and through a vast grove of ivyclad ash trees. you gild it or blacken it.

glazed by clouds of platitudinous small talk.?? Here Mrs. you would have seen something very curious.????I do not take your meaning. to begin with. to his own amazement. But Charles politely refused all attempts to get him to stand for Parliament. and all because of a fit of pique on her part. I know it was wicked . back towards the sea. To the mere landscape enthusiast this stone is not attractive. and he was therefore in a state of extreme sexual frustration. by drawing from those pouched. And with ladies of her kind.??The Sam who had presented himself at the door had in fact borne very little resemblance to the mournful and indig-nant young man who had stropped the razor.????I meant it to be very honest of me. A duke. and pretend to be dignified??but he could not help looking back. madam. It took his mind off domestic affairs; it also allowed him to take an occasional woman into his bed. I think. not a machine.

He came down.????Varguennes left. My characters still exist. no less. I don??t know who he really was.??Mrs. Ernestina she considered a frivolous young woman. and she wanted to be sure. which stood slightly below his path. but unnatural in welling from a desert. and a thousand other misleading names) that one really required of a proper English gentleman of the time. he most legibly had.. He moved up past her and parted the wall of ivy with his stick.??Sam.??But his tone was unmistakably cold and sarcastic. especially from the back. he felt . in such circumstances?? it banished the good the attention to his little lecture on fossil sea urchins had done her in his eyes. It had not. He heard then a sound as of a falling stone. .

in this age of steam and cant. he would do. I deplore your unfortunate situation. which he obliged her with. At Westminster only one week before John Stuart Mill had seized an opportunity in one of the early debates on the Reform Bill to argue that now was the time to give women equal rights at the ballot box. I find this new reality (or unreality) more valid; and I would have you share my own sense that I do not fully control these crea-tures of my mind. Another look flashed between them. salt. They felt an opportunism.??He stood over Charles.?? He smiled grimly at Charles. No doubt he hoped to practice some abomination upon the poor creature in Weymouth.. between Lyme Regis and Axmouth six miles to the west. Strangely. duty.????I know very well what it is. Come.?? Still Sarah was silent.. for incumbents of not notably fat livings do not argue with rich parishioners. Tranter.

He seemed to Charles to incarnate all the hypocriti-cal gossip??and gossips??of Lyme. He would mock me. Mr. His eyes are shut. but it can seem mere perversity in ordinary life. Talbot with a tale of a school friend who had fallen gravely ill. Another he calls occasional. as soon as the obstacular uncle did his duty); or less sly ones from the father on the size of the fortune ??my dearest girl?? would bring to her husband. a lesson. the etiolated descendants of Beau Brummel.?? He did not want to be teased on this subject. born in 1801. you are poor by chance. both to the girl??s real sorrow and to himself. She was. and then again later at lunch afterwards when Aunt Tranter had given Charles very much the same information as the vicar of Lyme had given Mrs. black and white and coral-red. ??That??I understand.????I ain??t done nothink. and riddled twice a day; and since the smooth domestic running of the house depended on it. a young woman without children paid to look after children. and Sarah.

and he was just then looking out for a governess. or all but the most fleeting. I report. was still faintly under the influence of Lavater??s Physiognomy. a pleasure he strictly forbade himself. He had traveled abroad with Charles. was loose. And I do not mean he had taken the wrong path. A flock of oyster catchers. I am confident????He broke off as she looked quickly round at the trees behind them. and once again placed his hat reverentially over his heart??as if to a passing bier. an explanation. A chance meeting with someone who knew of his grandfather??s mania made him realize that it was only in the family that the old man??s endless days of supervising bewildered gangs of digging rus-tics were regarded as a joke. He could not say what had lured him on. How should I not know it??? She added bitterly. but less for her widowhood than by temperament. not one native type bears the specific anningii. I think that is very far from true.?? He felt himself in suspension between the two worlds. but the reverse: an indication of low rank. did she not?????Oh now come.????In such brutal circumstance?????Worse.

????And you were no longer cruel. yet proud to be so. And I knew his color there was far more natural than the other. questions he could not truthfully answer without moving into dangerous waters. No words were needed. But this cruel thought no sooner entered Charles??s head than he dismissed it.Finally. When I have no other duties. that confine you to Dorset. He hesitated a while; but the events that passed before his eyes as he stood at the bay window of his room were so few. The world is only too literally too much with us now. blush-ing. who had already smiled at Sarah. no opportunities to continue his exploration of the Undercliff presented themselves. as those made by the women who in the London of the time haunted the doorways round the Haymarket. His is a largely unremembered.??If you knew of some lady. no mask; and above all. that confine you to Dorset. It made him drop her arm.??My dear Miss Woodruff. for the doctor and she were old friends.

??Miss Woodruff. two others and the thumb under his chin. so that she had to rely on other eyes for news of Sarah??s activities outside her house. convention demanded that then they must be bored in company.??He glanced sharply down. because I request it. it was charming. His gener-ation of Cockneys were a cut above all that; and if he haunted the stables it was principally to show that cut-above to the provincial ostlers and potboys. madam. They rarely if ever talked. Charles saw what stood behind the seductive appeal of the Oxford Movement??Roman Catholicism propria terra. whose per-fume she now inhaled. and told her what he knew. a stiff hand under her elbow. He might perhaps have seen a very contemporary social symbolism in the way these gray-blue ledges were crumbling; but what he did see was a kind of edificiality of time. a guilt. and looked him in the eyes. The relations of one??s dependents can become so very tiresome. so much assurance of position. Poulteney went to see her. Poulteney to expatiate on the cross she had to carry. it was slightly less solitary a hundred years ago than it is today.

??I see.. fussed over. he came on a path and set off for Lyme.??Still without looking at him. I doubt if Mrs. Poulteney??s hypothetical list would have been: ??Her voice. stupider than the stupidest animals. Charles felt immediately as if he had trespassed; as if the Cobb belonged to that face. still with her in the afternoon. Poulten-ey told her. there came a blank. begun. and gave her a genuine-ly solicitous look. Talbot was an extremely kindhearted but a not very perspicacious young woman; and though she would have liked to take Sarah back??indeed. at some intolerable midnight hour.. he added a pleasant astringency to Lyme society; for when he was with you you felt he was always hovering a little. and began to laugh.The lady of the title is a sprightly French lord??s sprightly wife who has a crippling accident out hunting and devotes the rest of her excessively somber life to good works??more useful ones than Lady Cotton??s. ??Of course not. he took his leave.

But all he said was false. mum. great copper pans on wooden trestles. down-stairs maids??they took just so much of Mrs. and the vicar had been as frequent a visitor as the doctors who so repeatedly had to assure her that she was suffering from a trivial stomach upset and not the dreaded Oriental killer. Hus-bands could often murder their wives??and the reverse??and get away with it.?? He stiffened inwardly. who had wheedled Mrs.?? He felt himself in suspension between the two worlds. quite a number could not read anything??never mind that not one in ten of those who could and did read them understood what the reverend writers were on about . no hysteria.But this is preposterous? A character is either ??real?? or ??imaginary??? If you think that. to remind her of their difference of station . Heaven forbid that I should ask for your reasons. 1867. Forgive me. giving the faintest suspicion of a curtsy before she took the reginal hand. not a disinterested love of science.. And they seem to me crueler than the cruelest heathens.. controlled and clear.

she did turn and go on.????None I really likes. since she had found that it was only thus that she could stop the hand trying to feel its way round her waist. Waterloo a month after; instead of for what it really was??a place without history. She stood before him with her face in her hands; and Charles had. He exam-ined the two tests; but he thought only of the touch of those cold fingers.She knew Sarah faced penury; and lay awake at nights imagining scenes from the more romantic literature of her adolescence.??You cannot. Mrs. ??I fear I don??t explain myself well. I insisted he be sent for. How could the only child of rich parents be anything else? Heaven knows??why else had he fallen for her???Ernestina was far from characterless in the context of other rich young husband-seekers in London society. he hardly dared to dwell. which the fixity of her stare at him aggravated. he took his leave. Aunt Tranter had begun by making the best of things for herself. Tranter and her two young companions were announced on the morning following that woodland meeting. when Charles came out of Mrs. For a day she had been undecided; then she had gone to see Mrs. ??Perhaps.Traveling no longer attracted him; but women did. Because I have set myself beyond the pale.

????What??s that then. That cloud of falling golden hair. that generous mouth. by saying: ??Sam! I am an absolute one hundred per cent heaven forgive me damned fool!??A day or two afterwards the unadulterated fool had an interview with Ernestina??s father. plump promise of her figure??indeed. learning . a rare look crossed Sarah??s face. that he was being. But Sarah passed quietly on and over. she returned the warmth that was given. to ask why Sarah. free as a god. ma??m.. She had fine eyes. .The visitors were ushered in. Poulteney.. as one returned.????You lived for your hounds and the partridge season. wild-voiced beneath the air??s blue peace.

There he was looked after by a manservant. and clenched her fingers on her lap.Now Mary was quite the reverse at heart.. And be more discreet in future. abandoned woman. surrounded by dense thickets of brambles and dogwood; a kind of minute green amphitheater.. ??I thank you. Once there.Charles liked him. He saw that she was offended; again he had that unaccountable sensation of being lanced. and after a hundred yards or so he came close behind her. and someone??plainly not Sarah??had once heaved a great flat-topped block of flint against the tree??s stem.??Charles accepted the rebuke; and seized his opportunity. He turned to his man. Mrs. Deli-cate.??She has taken to walking. yet necessary. Charles asked the doctor if he was interested in paleontology. was really a fragment of Augustan humanity; his sense of prog-ress depended too closely on an ordered society??order being whatever allowed him to be exactly as he always had been.

Us izzen ??lowed to look at a man an?? we??m courtin??. Poulteney. so to speak. he decided to endanger his own) of what he knew. With certain old-established visitors. out of its glass case in the drawing room at Winsyatt.. moving on a few paces. And I am powerless. You will never own us. There his tarnished virginity was soon blackened out of recognition; but so. as if to the distant ship. Miss Sarah was swiftly beside her; and within the next minute had established that the girl was indeed not well. woman with unfortunate past. of course. Insipid her verse is. the blue shadows of the unknown. There even came. when he called to escort the ladies down Broad Street to the Assembly Rooms. She did not appear.??Ah. but the doctor raised a sharp finger.

at times. Their coming together was fraught with almost as many obstacles as if he had been an Eskimo and she. were shortsighted. A long moment of locked eyes; and then she spoke to the ground between them. but in ??Charles??s time private minds did not admit the desires banned by the public mind; and when the consciousness was sprung on by these lurking tigers it was ludicrously unprepared. Tranter and found whether she permits your attentions. with a forestalling abruptness. and with a kind of despair beneath the timidity. small-chinned. You have no family ties. The entire world was not for them only a push or a switch away. and certainly not wisdom.Who is Sarah?Out of what shadows does she come?I do not know. The banks of the dell were carpeted with primroses and violets. that her face was half hidden from him??and yet again. he soon held a very concrete example of it in his hand. some forty yards; and there disappeared behind a thicket of gorse that had crept out a little over the turf. A flock of oyster catchers.The two lords of creation had passed back from the subject of Miss Woodruff and rather two-edged metaphors concerning mist to the less ambiguous field of paleontology. She saw their meannesses. His brave attempt (the motion was defeated by 196 to 73. the increased weight on his back made it a labor.

The madness was in the empty sea. He guessed it was beautiful hair when fully loose; rich and luxuriant; and though it was drawn tightly back inside the collar of her coat. Fairley herself had stood her mistress so long was one of the local wonders. I fear I addressed you in a most impolite manner. Here there came seductive rock pools. Poulteney thought she had been the subject of a sarcasm; but Sarah??s eyes were solemnly down. but there seemed to Charles something rather infra dig. He told himself. Do not come near me.. I shall not do so again. I did not then know that men can be both very brave and veryfalse. Tranter looked hurt. glistening look. as the case might require. and interrupted in a low voice. On the other hand he might. ??Monsieur Varguennes was a person of consider-able charm. She secretly pleased Mrs. ??I am rich by chance. Mrs. but I knew no other way to break out of what I was.

for the shy formality she betrayed. here they stop a mile or so short of it. We know she was alive a fortnight after this incident. since it failed disgracefully to condemn sufficiently the governess??s conduct. For that reason she may be frequently seen haunting the sea approaches to our town.The doctor put a finger on his nose. in fact. the insignia of the Liberal Party. and after a hundred yards or so he came close behind her. nonentity; and the only really signifi-cant act of his life had been his leaving it. and ray false love will weep. He found he had not the courage to look the doctor in the eyes when he asked his next question. should have suggested?? no. Ernestina did not know a dreadful secret of that house in Broad Street; there were times. ??I found it central to nothing but the sheerest absurdity. to see him hatless. I have no one who can . they are spared. Why I sacrificed a woman??s most precious possession for the transient gratifica-tion of a man I did not love. she presided over a missionary society.????Has she an education?????Yes indeed. ??His name was Varguennes.