And so it befell that Elizabeth Hand, whose blunt ways, unlovely person, and temperament so oddly nervous and reserved, kept her from attracting any "sweetheart" of her own class, had unconsciously imbibed her mistress's theory of love. Love, pure and simple, the very deepest and highest, sweetest and most solemn thing in life: to be believed in devoutly until it came, and when it did come, to be held to, firmly, faithfully, with a single-minded, settled constancy, till death. A creed, quite impossible, many will say, in this ordinary world, and most dangerous to be put into the head of a poor servant. Yet a woman is but a woman, be she maid-servant or queen; and if, from queens to maid-servants, girls were taught thus to think of love, there might be a few more "broken" hearts perhaps, but there would certainly be fewer wicked hearts; far fewer corrupted lives of men, and degraded lives of women; far fewer unholy marriages, and desolated, dreary, homeless homes. Elizabeth, having cleared away her tea-things, stood listening to the voices in the parlor, and pondering. She had sometimes wondered in her own mind that no knight ever came to carry off her charming princess--her admired and beloved Miss Hilary. Miss Hilary, on her part, seemed totally indifferent to the youths at Stowbury; who indeed were, Elizabeth allowed, quite unworthy her regard. The only suitable lover for her young mistress must be somebody exceedingly grand and noble--a compound of the best heroes of Shakespeare, Scott, Fenimore Cooper, Maria Edgeworth, and Harriet Martineau. When this strange gentleman appeared--in ordinary coat and hat, or rather Glengary bonnet, neither particularly handsome nor particularly tall, yet whose coming had evidently given Miss Hilary so much pleasure, and who, once or twice while waiting at tea, Elizabeth fancied she had seen looking at Miss Hilary as nobody ever looked before--when Mr. Robert Lyon appeared on the horizon, the faithful "bower maiden" was a good deal disappointed. She had expected something better; at all events, something different. Her first brilliant castle in the air fell, poor lass! but she quickly built it up again, and, with the vivid imagination of her age, she mapped out the whole future, ending by a vision of Miss Hilary, all in white, sweeping down the Terrace in a carriage and pair--to fortune and happiness; leaving herself, though with a sore want at her heart, and a great longing to follow, to devote the remainder of her natural life to Miss Johanna. "Her couldna do without somebody to see to her--and Miss Selina do worrit her so." muttered Elizabeth, in the excitement of this Almaschar vision, relapsing into her old provincialisms. "So, even if Miss Hilary axes me to come, I'll stop, I reckon. Ay, I'll stop wi' Miss Leaf."