The whole plan of his present life, the footing upon which he meant Lady Fitzhenry and himself to live together, was, perhaps of foreign growth. A true-bred Englishman would never have behaved with the civility of good breeding to a wife so forced upon him. He could never have thought it possible to have established any one in his house on the terms on which Emmeline was to be placed. But although Lord Fitzhenry looked upon the observance of English customs in a total retirement after marriage as particularly irksome, it never could make him wanting in respect, and even in kindness, to one of Emmeline’s sex. His will once made known,—told, as it had been, very plainly and decidedly,—there was nothing more to settle between them, and he behaved to her with that sort of general observance and attention due from a man to a woman. In short, he could not help being agreeable, although differing so cruelly from the animated, enthusiastic Fitzhenry, known to his friends. Perhaps such conduct was more calculated to excite despair than even apparent dislike would have been to one, who, like Emmeline, aimed at winning his love; but, quick as she was, her inexperience prevented her from being aware, that these attentions of civility were paid by him from mere force of habit; she therefore gave way to the charm which daily captivated her, and did not always suspect that those words on which her ear delighted to hang, and which sometimes even wore the semblance of gallantry, were uttered by him generally in total absence of mind, with his thoughts fixed on another. Who that other was, Emmeline no longer doubted. Something she recollected having heard of Lord Fitzhenry’s admiration for Lady Florence Mostyn, when abroad; but he had then been so long out of England, Emmeline’s thoughts were little occupied about him, and the intelligence had made but slight impression on her young mind. Now, putting various circumstances together, she could no longer doubt that Lady Florence was her favoured rival, if indeed a rival she could be called, where there was no competition.