"Mr. and Mrs. Morris settled near the Lynns, and visited very frequently; the young wife professed an ardent attachment to Jane, and sought her society constantly, while Jane instinctively shrunk more and more within herself. She saw with painful regret that Morris seemed to find his happiness at their fireside rather than his own. He had been captivated by the freshness and beauty of his young wife, who, schooled by a designing mother, had flattered him by her evident preference; he had, to use an old and coarse adage, 'married in haste to repent at leisure;' and now that the first novelty of his position had worn off, his feelings returned with renewed warmth to the earlier object of his attachment. Delicacy toward her daughter prevented Mrs. Lynn from treating him with the indignation she felt; and Jane, calm and self-possessed, seemed to have overcome every feeling of the past. The consciousness of right upheld her; she had not given her affection unsought; he had plead for it passionately, earnestly, else had she never lavished the hoarded tenderness of years on one so different from her own ideal; but that tenderness once poured forth, could never more return to her; the fountain of the heart was dried, henceforth she lived but in the past." "Mr. and Mrs. Morris were an ill-assorted couple; she, gay, volatile, possessing little affection for her husband, and, what was in his eyes even worse, no respect for his opinions, which he always considered as infallible. As their family increased, their differences augmented. The badly regulated household of a careless wife and mother was intolerable to the methodical habits of the bachelor husband; and while the wife sought for Jane to condole with her--though she neglected her advice--the husband found his greatest enjoyment at his old bachelor home, and once so far forgot himself as to express to Jane his regret at the step he had taken, and declared he deserved his punishment. Jane made no reply, but ever after avoided all opportunity for such expressions." "In the meantime Mrs. Lynn's health declined, and they retired to a smaller dwelling, where Jane devoted herself to her mother, and increased their small income by the arduous duties of daily governess. Her cheek paled, and her eye grew dim beneath the complicated trials of her situation; and there were moments when visions of the bright future once promised rose up as if in mockery of the dreary present; hope is the parent of disappointment, and the vista of happiness once opened to her view made the succeeding gloom still deeper. But she did not repine; upheld by her devotedness to her mother, she guarded her tenderly until her death, which occurred five years after the marriage of Mr. Morris."