The time came when to her cool reason this shrinking wore the aspect of a weakness. When so much happiness for all those she loved depended upon the conquering of it, what folly not to conquer it! Here was the obverse of that distrust of “blind passion” which they had taught her. Whether it was an emotion towards or away from a man, was it a thing which should dominate a woman’s life? Was it not rather a thing for her to beat into whatever shape her good sense directed? Seated one day in her mother’s room, Sylvia asked, quite casually, “Mamma, how often do women marry the men they love?” “Why, what makes you ask that?” inquired the other. “I don’t know, Mamma. I was just thinking.” “Miss Margaret” considered. “Not often, my child; certainly not, if you mean their first love.” Then, after a pause, she added, “I think perhaps it’s well they don’t. Most all those I know who married their first love are unhappy now.” “Why is that, Mamma?” “They don’t seem able to judge wisely when they’re young and blinded by passion.” “Miss Margaret” drifted into reminiscences—beginning with the case of Aunt Varina, who was in the next room. “It seems such a terrible thing,” said Sylvia. “Love is—well, it makes you want to trust it.” “Something generally happens,” replied the other. “A woman has to wait, and in the end she marries for quite other reasons.” “And yet they manage to make out!” said the girl, half to herself. “Children come, dear. Children take their time, and they forget. I remember so well your Uncle Barry’s wife—she visited us in her courtship days, and she used to wake up in the middle of the night, and whisper to me in a trembling voice, ‘Margaret, tell me—_shall_ I marry him?’ I think she went to the altar without really having her mind made up; and yet, you see, she’s one of the happiest women I know—they are perfectly devoted to each other.” Sylvia went away to ponder these things. The next day Aunt Varina happened to talk about her life-tragedy, and told Sylvia of the death of her young love; and later on came Uncle Barry’s wife, traveling a hundred miles for the sake of a casual conversation upon the state of happiness vouchsafed to those who chose their husbands in accordance with reason. All of which was managed with such delicacy and tact that no one but an utterly depraved person like Sylvia would ever have suspected that it was planned. There was one person from whom the girl hoped for an unworldly opinion; that was the Bishop. She went to see him one day, and casually brought up the subject of van Tuiver—a thing which was easy enough to do, since the man was a guest in the house. “Sylvia,” said her uncle, at once, “why don’t you marry him?” The girl was astounded. “Why, Uncle Basil!” she exclaimed. “Would you advise me to?” “Nothing would make me happier than the news that you had so decided.”