interest, or raise its consequence. This doctrine her ladyship had repeated for years so often and so dogmatically, that she conceived it to be incontrovertible, and of as full force as any law of the land, or as any moral or religious obligation. She would as soon have suspected her niece of an intention of stealing her diamond necklace as of purloining Colambre’s heart, or marrying this heir of the house of Clonbrony. Miss Nugent was so well apprized, and so thoroughly convinced of all this, that she never for one moment allowed herself to think of Lord Colambre as a lover. Duty, honour, and gratitude--gratitude, the strong feeling and principle of her mind--forbade it; she had so prepared and accustomed herself to consider him as a person with whom she could not possibly be united, that, with perfect ease and simplicity, she behaved towards him exactly as if he were her brother--not in the equivocating sentimental romance style in which ladies talk of treating men as their brothers, whom they are all the time secretly thinking of and endeavouring to please as lovers--not using this phrase, as a convenient pretence, a safe mode of securing herself from suspicion or scandal, and of enjoying the advantages of confidence and the intimacy of friendship, till the propitious moment, when it should be time to declare or avow _the secret of the heart_. No: this young lady was quite above all double dealing; she had no mental reservation--no metaphysical subtleties--but, with plain, unsophisticated morality, in good faith and simple truth, acted as she professed, thought what she said, and was that which she seemed to be.