But for that very reason it appeared doubtful if she could descend from her height of ripe majestic matronhood to the dramatist’s idea of a single-hearted love-lorn Italian girl. Even Mrs. Siddons’ superbly developed personal traits might turn to faults and work against her in the attempt to personate the slender, tender daughter of the Capulets. But no sooner did the enchantress come before her judges and begin to weave her spells, than the velvet eyes, with their rich lashes, the white pillars of arms with their regal sweep, became the fond dreamy eyes, the loving, clinging arms inspired by the soul of youthful, radiant, all-defying passion in Juliet. These two—Lady Bell and Captain Fane—looked at and listened to their own story. True, they were not of sufficiently mighty quality to belong to great rival houses, but the couple belonged in a measure to different classes. Lady Bell might aspire to prospects as far ahead of the naval captain at her side, though he was born and bred in her rank, as were a Vice-Admiral’s commission, and Westminster Abbey. The circumstance that the difference between Lady Bell and Captain Fane was comparatively slight, only rendered it more cruel if it were to part them, since it did anything save prevent the rose from smelling as sweet. To sit together at such a play interpreted by so consummate an actress, and an actor who was not immeasurably behind her, was to sit like the guilty King and Queen of Denmark and witness their crime shadowed forth by the players. But whereas it was the past which was held up before the shrinking eyes of the Royal Danes, it seemed a dazzling glimpse of the future which was vouchsafed to these lovers. The secret of Lady Bell and Captain Fane, so far as it had remained any secret to them, was spoken out in Shakespeare’s words and by Siddons’ and Kemble’s voices. The true lovers there of whom the others were but a vivid realization, sat with heaving breasts, flushed faces, and eyes fixed on the stage, and dared not glance at each other (did not need to for that matter), each to understand what the other felt—save once or twice. At the masqued ball in the Capulets’ house, when fortune favoured the brave so signally as to find the daring intruder his fit partner in the daughter of the house, in a trice, Captain Fane and Lady Bell turned simultaneously to smile to each other and to afford the opportunity for the whisper on his part, “That fellow was in luck—he was not long in receiving his prize.” At the first suggestion of a private marriage, Captain Fane again sought and received a look as by irresistible fascination. “Do you mark that?” said the swift meaning glance of his eyes, before which Lady Bell’s eyes swam and fell as they had never swum and fallen before.