Yet, notwithstanding all this, I was not happy. The rooms were so numerous that I was often lost in my own house, and sometimes got into awkward predicaments in attempting to find some particular apartment. Our high-bred guests despised me for my clownish manners and deportment. I was forced to bear patiently the most humiliating jokes and sneers from noble lips. My own servants insulted me with impunity; and, finally, my wife’s temper showed itself every day more and more in the most hideous light. She became terribly jealous, and would hardly suffer me to go out of her sight a moment. In short, before the end of three months I sincerely wished myself separated from her and reduced again to the situation of a plain and coarse but honest and contented ploughboy. This separation was occasioned by the following incident sooner than I expected. At a party which we gave one evening there chanced to be present a young lady named Cecilia Standon. She possessed no mean share of beauty, and had besides the most graceful demeanour I ever saw. Her manner was kind, gentle, and obliging, without any of that haughty superciliousness which so annoyed me in others of my fashionable acquaintances. If I made a foolish observation or transgressed against the rules of politeness she did not give vent to her contempt in a laugh or suppressed titter, but informed me in a whisper what I ought to have done, and instructed me how to do it. When she was gone I remarked to my wife what a kind and excellent lady Miss Cecilia Standon was. ‘Yes,’ exclaimed she, reddening, ‘every one can please you but me. Don’t think to elude my vigilance, I saw you talking and laughing with her, you low-born creature whom I raised from obscurity to splendour. And yet not one spark of gratitude do you feel towards me. But I will have my revenge.’ So saying she left me to meditate alone on what that revenge might be. The same night, as I lay in bed restless, I heard suddenly a noise of footsteps outside the chamber door. Compelled by irresistible curiosity, I rose and opened it without making any sound. My surprise was great on beholding the figure of my wife stealing along on tiptoe with her back towards me, and a lighted candle in her hand. Anxious to know what could be her motive for walking about the house at this time of night I followed softly, taking care to time my steps so as to coincide with hers. After proceeding along many passages and galleries which I had never before seen, we descended a very long staircase that led us underneath the coal and wine cellars to a damp, subterraneous vault. Here she stopped and deposited the candle on the ground. I shrank instinctively, for the purpose of concealment, behind a massive stone pillar which upheld the arched roof on one side.