“Oh, madam! I know what I would say to you, if I only knew how to say it. Heaven sends divine thoughts and feelings into my heart, and brain sometimes, but they cannot pass thence into words—they are choked up perhaps by sin or imperfection. Such a feeling I have now—heavenly light, if I could only refract it—” She paused an instant, unconscious that the lady was looking intently upon her. Then she spoke again, slowly, in a kind of calm fervor—“Real affection—I do not mean passion or imagination—but real love does _never_ invest its object with _un_real virtues!—never!—all faults are the excess or the deficiency of some virtue—well, real love sees its object not perhaps as he is at his worst—not even perhaps so evil as he is even at his best, but as he may become!—as he surely _will_ become, if that real affection continues faithful to its trust. Ah! how strong that conviction is in my heart—how weak upon my lips!” “I understand you, Catherine, and may your true affection be the divine alchemy that shall transmute all Archer Clifton’s faults into virtues.” At this personal reply, Catherine’s eyes fell and her cheeks burned with sudden self-recollection, and for weeks after this she could not recall the conversation without deep blushes. More and more freely as the weeks passed by did Mrs. Clifton talk to Kate of her son and his peculiarities, and the best way to meet them. “You know, my dear Catherine, the apostle, in order to win proselytes, made himself all things to all men. Archer is proud, and my dear girl must raise herself a little out of that humility of manner which is very distasteful to the haughty, except when exhibited towards themselves, when it naturally becomes very acceptable.” This style of conversation, addressed to her for weeks and months, was at once very pleasing and very painful to Kate. It was sweet, it was dear beyond measure, to be considered in this near relation to her beloved, to be addressed daily and hourly as if she possessed the power of rendering his future life better and happier, and so addressed by his own mother, too, but it was also humiliating to be supposed to presume on the future esteem and affection of one who had never addressed the language of love to her. Often she thought of begging Mrs. Clifton to desist from this style of conversation; but a certain bashfulness, a deep respect for the lady, a distrust of herself and of her own experience, and the childish thought that Major Clifton might have entrusted to his mother an intention that he never confided to herself its object, and the delight of living in this blessed illusion, and the fear of breaking the charm, kept her silent for a long time, during which Mrs. Clifton gradually fell into the manner of considering her and speaking to her as her son’s future wife. All at once one day it suddenly struck Kate that Mrs. Clifton might be the victim of a mistake, and under the impression that some