The friends whom Mrs. Linwood gathered around her were not the idle devotees of fashion,--the parasites of wealth; but intelligent, literary people, whose society was a source of improvement as well as pleasure. Sometimes, circumstances of commanding character forced her to receive as guests those whom her judgment would never have selected, as in the case of Madge Wildfire; but in general it was a distinction to be invited to Grandison Place, whose elegant hospitalities were the boast of the town to which it belonged. The only drawback to my happiness was the pensiveness that hung like a soft cloud over the spirits of Edith. She was still kind and affectionate to me; but the sweet unreserve of former intercourse was gone. I had come between her and her brother's heart. I was the shadow on her dial of flowers, that made their bloom wither. I never walked with Ernest alone without fearing to give her pain. I never sat with him on the seat beneath the elm, in the starry eventide, or at moonlight's hour, without feeling that she followed us in secret with a saddened glance. At first, whenever he came to me to walk with him, I would say,-- "Wait till I go for Edith." "Very well," he would answer, "if there is nothing in your heart that pleads for a nearer communion than that which we enjoy in the presence of others, a dearer interchange of thought and feeling, let Edith, let the whole world come." "It is for her sake, not mine, I speak,--I cannot bear the soft reproach of her loving eye!" "A sister's affection must not be too exacting," was the reply. "All that the fondest brother can bestow, I give to Edith; but there are gifts she may not share,--an inner temple she cannot enter,--reserved alone for you. Come, the flowers are wasting their fragrance, the stars their lustre!" How could I plead for Edith, after being silenced by such arguments? And how could I tell her that I had interceded for her in vain? I never imagined before that a sister's love could be _jealous_; but the same hereditary passion which was transmitted to his bosom through a father's blood, reigned in hers, though in a gentler form. Every one who has studied human nature must have observed predominant family traits, as marked as the attributes of different trees and blossoms,--traits which, descending from parent to children, individualize them from the great family of mankind. In some, pride towers and spreads like the great grove tree of India, the branches taking root and forming trunks which put forth a wealth of foliage, rank and unhealthy. In others, obstinacy plants itself like a rock, which the winds and waves of opinion cannot move. In a few, jealousy coils itself with lengthening fold, which, like the serpent that wrapped itself round Laocoon and his sons, makes parents and children its unhappy victims.