"And apropos of that--rather neatly expressed, I find that is--there is another female pretender to power--my cousin Annette; you have heard me speak of her as a ward of my people's, and resident with them. She has grown into a fine young woman, though her manners are decidedly odd. I suppose this is country breeding: said as much to the governor, who made a very odd face and changed the subject. Whether he thought it the height of impudence in me to suppose that anyone who had had the advantage of studying him daily could have country manners, or whether there was any other reason, I don't know. "One thing there can be no doubt of, and that is, that I am always being thrown _tête-à,-tête_ with this young woman, principally, as I imagine, by my mother's connivance. This might have been amusing under other circumstances, for, as I said before, she is remarkably personable and nice--not in my line, but still a very fine young woman; but, situated as I am, I do not avail myself in the slightest degree of the opportunities offered. "Nor, I am bound to say, does Annette. She sits silent, and sometimes actually sullen. She is a most extraordinary girl, George; I can't make her out a bit. Sometimes she won't speak for hours, sometimes won't even come down amongst us, and---- There is something deuced odd in all this! I wish I had your clear old head here to scrutinise matters with me, and help me in forming a judgment on them. "You know what I refer to just above, about 'under other circumstances?' Certain interview in Kensington Gardens, with certain party that you happened to witness. Don't you recollect? Oh Lord, George, if you knew what an utterly gone 'coon I am in that quarter, you would pity me. No, you wouldn't! What's the use of talking to such a dried-up old file as you about such things? I don't believe you were ever in love in your life, ever felt the smallest twinge of what those stupid fools the poets call the 'gentle passion.' Gentle, by Jove! it's anything but gentle with me--upsets me frightfully, takes away all my sleep, and worries me out of my life. I swear to you, that now I am separated from her, I don't know how to live without her, and wonder how I ever got on before I knew her. When I think I'm far away from everybody, on the cliffs or down by the sea, I find myself holloing out aloud, and stamping my foot, for sheer rage at the thought that so much more time must go by before I can see her again. I told you it was a strong case, George, when you spoke to me about it; but I had no idea then that it was so strong as it is, or that my happiness was half so much bound up in her." There was a space here, and the conclusion of the letter, from the appearance of the ink, had evidently been written at a different time. "I left off there, George, thinking I might have something else to say to you later; and so I have, but of a very different kind from what I imagined.