Could not this change be made, the circumstances which were taking place at Morley House, and, what is still more important, the feelings which were thrilling in the bosoms of its inhabitants, would of necessity be all left untold, or be related in a long unnatural resume. In truth, the feelings of which we speak are worth some consideration; as feelings, indeed, always are: for, could one write the history of man's heart and its motives, how much more interesting, and instructive too, would the record be, than the brightest volume that ever was written upon man's actions! For some time after Colonel Manners quitted Morley House, Marian de Vaux continued to sleep under the influence of strong opiates, which the medical man had found it necessary to give her in the morning. Whether he did right or wrong--whether it would have been better to let her meet grief boldly face to face, or was better to shield her from the violence of its first attack--each must judge as he feels; but he had known her from a child, and he had a notion that hers was a heart which would be easily broken if sorrow was suffered to handle it too roughly. At all events, while this state continued, she enjoyed a cessation from grief and apprehension; but still, how different was her slumber from the calm and natural repose of a heart at ease! The dull poppy with its leaden weight seemed to keep down and oppress feeling and thought, not to relieve and refresh them; and in her beautiful face, even as she slept, there was something which told that the slumber was not natural. Oh! the sweet profound sleep of infancy, how beautiful it is! that soft and blessed gift of a heart without a stain or a pang, of a body unbroken in any fibre by the cares and labours of existence, of a mind without a burden or an apprehension. It falls down upon our eyelids like the dew of a summer's eve, refreshing for our use all the world of flowers in which we dwell, and passing calm, and tranquil, and happy, without a dream and without an interruption. But, alas! alas! with the first years of life it is gone, and never returns. We may win joy, and satisfaction, and glory, and splendour, and power--we may obtain more than our wildest ambition aspired to, or our eager hope could grasp; but the sweet sleep of infancy, the soft companion of our boyish pillow, flies from the ardent joys as well as the bitter cares of manhood, and never, never, never returns again.