Mrs. Lesly had been, as a girl, both beautiful and accomplished, gifted with good natural talents, though possessing little perseverance and much indolence of character. Upon her marriage every faculty of her mind became absorbed in devotion to her husband, and an almost indolent dependence on his will. Since his death she had continued so very depressed that, at the time when both Mabel and Amy might have much needed a mother's care, she felt every exertion too great for her weakened nerves and failing health. She had, by her marriage, entered a family a little above her own, and now suffered the too general consequence, in the neglect of her husband's relations. She felt all things deeply, and this, if possible, aggravated her loss. The Lesly and Hargrave families were closely connected, but the absence of the Colonel, whose family mansion lay so near them, prevented her receiving that attention which the neighbourhood of a rich relation might have procured her. The secluded life to which she now clung so earnestly, only increased the extreme sensitiveness of her feelings. Her mind therefore, suffered to prey upon itself, became a curse instead of a blessing, as it might have been, had it been employed in any useful purpose; and the delicacy and refinement of her nature, now only quickened her perception of the slightest coldness, or unkindness in those around her; spreading about her a kind of atmosphere of refined suffering, which duller eyes would never have discovered. Yet the indulgence which she claimed from others always rendered her an object of affection, and her devotion to the memory of her husband veiled many failings, and excused her indolence sometimes even in the eyes of the most ascetic. Joined to this weakness of character, however, she possessed many fine qualities. She was generous in the extreme, and liberal to a total forgetfulness of self, and would forgive, where no injury was intended, with a magnanimity, which, applied to a real offence, would have been noble. She was also very patient under the oppression of continual ill health, and though too indolent to exert herself, she was capable of suffering without complaint. Mabel inherited her mother's intellect and delicacy of feeling, but seconded by a strong will and great common sense. She possessed also beauty equal, if not superior, to hers, though in her face it always seemed secondary to the feelings which were spoken by it. But there was one peculiar charm in her character, which secured the love of those around her as powerfully as an Eastern talisman. It was a reliance on the good will of others, drawn perhaps from the reflection of her own heart--a kind of security in the feeling that there is always good to those who rightly seek it; a trust in the virtue of others which often proves a touchstone to wake its hidden springs, whilst all feel ashamed of disappointing a hope, founded more on the truest feelings of charity, than on weakness or pusillanimity.