As a dog, that cannot ask you verbally to scratch his head, but wishes it, will again and again thrust his head into your hand, petitioning mutely that affection may divine him, so:--but we deal with a sentimentalist, and the simile is too gross to be exact. For no sooner was Wilfrid's head scratched, than the operation stuck him as humiliating; in other words, the moment he felt his sisters fingers in the ticklish part, he flew to another theme, then returned, and so backward and forward--mystifying her not slightly, and making her think, "Then he has no heart." She by no means intended to encourage love for Emilia, but she hoped for his sake, that the sentiment he had indulged was sincere. By-and-by he said, that though he had no particular affection for Lady Charlotte, he should probably marry her. "Without loving her, Wilfrid? It is unfair to her; it is unfair to yourself." Wilfrid understood perfectly who it was for whom she pleaded thus vehemently. He let her continue: and when she had dwelt on the horrors of marriages without love, and the supreme duty of espousing one who has our 'heart's loyalty,' he said, "You may be right. A man must not play with a girl. He must consider that he owes a duty to one who is more dependent;"--implying that a woman s duty was distinct and different in such a case. Cornelia could not rise and plead for her sex. Had she pushed forth the 'woman,' she must have stood for her. This is the game of Fine Shades and Nice Feelings, under whose empire you see this family, and from which they are to emerge considerably shorn, but purified--examples of One present passage of our civilization. "At least, dear, if" (Cornelia desperately breathed the name) "--if Emilia were forced to give her hand...loving...you...we should be right in pitying her?" The snare was almost too palpable. Wilfrid fell into it, from the simple passion that the name inspired; and now his hand tightened. "Poor child!" he moaned. She praised his kind heart: "You cannot be unjust and harsh, I know that. You could not see her--me--any of us miserable. Women feel, dear. Ah! I need not tell you that. Their tears are not the witnesses. When they do not weep, but the hot drops stream inwardly:--and, oh! Wilfrid, let this never happen to me. I shall not disgrace you, because I intend to see you happy with...with her, whoever she is; and I would leave you happy. But I should not survive it. I can look on Death. A marriage without love is dishonour." Sentiment enjoys its splendid moods. Wilfrid having had the figure of his beloved given to him under nuptial benediction, cloaked, even as he wished it to be, could afford now to commiserate his sister, and he admired her at the same time. "I'll take care you are not made a sacrifice of when the event is fixed," he said--as if it had never been in contemplation.