“I love her! I love her! It is no use, I _do_ love her! Every day more deeply and desperately I love her! In her presence all her unworthiness is forgotten or disbelieved! Yes! yes! her deep hypocrisy, her black ingratitude, my mother’s wrongs, all, all are lost to memory! Just now I could have snatched her to my bosom and wept over her falsehood, rather than have cast her from me! Yes, more! I could have implored her forgiveness for ever believing in that guilt which is but too well proved! I love her! She is the pulse of my heart! the soul of my life! She embodies all the meaning of existence to me! Heart and brain—yes!—body, soul and spirit starve, perish for a full reconciliation and a perfect union with her! She is lovely, she is beautiful to me! She always was! Yet, oh! Apple of Sodom, that she is! shall I take such falsehood and corruption to my heart. I must leave the house! must leave the neighborhood! for here I wilt and wither! And she! how _can_ she bear it? for I think, with all her falseness, she loves me very much. How _can_ she bear life so? How can she rise each morning and go through all the occupations of the day so regularly, quietly, cheerfully, day after day?—omitting no duty, domestic or social, small or great, from the stitching my ripped gloves, to the keeping up of the county connection, in sooth! While _I_, I daily wilt, wither, in this moral mildew—idle, despairing, forgetting all my obligations—forgetting that my country needs my arm! This cannot last! This must not be! I must get away from here! I must raise a volunteer company, and offer myself to the government, and in the tumult of the campaign find forgetfulness or a grave!” Unable to compose himself again that morning, he rang the bell, ordered his horse, seized his hat, went out, mounted, and rode away. The next morning Catherine arose early, and among her orders for the day directed that the carriage should be at the door by ten o’clock. At the appointed hour she attired herself with care and taste, and went down into the front hall, where she found Major Clifton in readiness to attend her. They entered the carriage and set out, and in the course of a drive of five or six hours’ duration, made the circuit of the neighborhood, calling upon several families. And everywhere Catherine was received with distinguished respect. They reached home again about the middle of the afternoon. The next few days passed on in the usual dreary routine—except that Catherine knew Major Clifton was out riding every day and all day, and that he was in his study writing half the night. She did not know what this portended until one morning he said to her— “Mrs. Clifton, you will oblige me by having my wardrobe prepared and packed at your earliest convenience. I have orders to join the —— regiment within a week.” Catherine turned very pale and reeled as if she would have fallen, but grasped the chair and steadied herself, till strength returned.