"Have no fear for your self-esteem so far as the Comte de Morangy is concerned; I have never loved him. He is one of the innumerable weak creatures who have failed--even with my assistance, alas!--to make my dead heart beat again. I would not even want him for a husband. A man of his rank always sells too dear the protection he bestows, by always making it felt. And then, I detest marriage, I detest all men, I detest everlasting pledges, promises, plans, the arranging of the future, in advance, by contracts and bargains at which Destiny always snaps its fingers. I no longer care for anything but travel, reverie, solitude, the uproar of the world, to walk through it and laugh at it, and poetry to endure the past, and God to give me hope for the future." Sir Lionel Bridgemont's self-esteem was deeply mortified at first; for, to console those readers who may have become too warmly interested in him, we must say that in forty hours he had reflected seriously. In the first place, he thought of taking horse, following Lady Blake, overcoming her resistance, and triumphing over her cold common-sense. Then he thought that she might persist in her refusal, and that, meanwhile, Miss Ellis might take offence at his conduct, and break off the match.--He remained. "Well," said Henry to him, the next day, when he saw him kiss Miss Margaret's hand, who bestowed that mark of forgiveness on him, after a sharp quarrel concerning his absence; "next year, we will enter Parliament." [Footnote 2: Written thus, in English, in the original.]