There is a mate for Molly! the mate she chose for herself!
So much for the husband. What else has marriage brought her?
A title--I am _my lady_. For three days it sounded prettily in my ears. But to the girl who refused a duchess' coronet, who was born comtesse--to be the baronet's lady--Tanty may say what she likes of the age of creation, and all the rest of it--that advantage cannot weigh heavy in the balance. Again then, I have a splendid house--which is my prison, and in which, like all prisoners, I have not the right to choose my company--else would Sophia and Rupert still be here? They are going, I am told occasionally; but my intimate conviction is, however often they may be going, _they will never go_. _Item four:_ I have money, and nothing to spend it on--but the poor.
What next? What next?--alas, I look and I find nothing! This is all that marriage has brought me; and what has it not taken from me?
My delight in existence, my independence, my hopes, my belief in the future, my belief in _love_. Faith, hope, and charity, in fact, destroyed at one fell sweep. And all, to gratify my curiosity as to a romantic mystery, my vanity as to my own powers of fascination! Well, I have solved the mystery, and behold it was nothing. I have eaten of the fruit of knowledge, and it is tasteless in my mouth.
I have made my capture with my little bow and spear, and I am as embarrassed of my captive as he of me. We pull at the chain that binds us together; nay, such being the law of this world between men and women, the positions are reversed, my captive is now my master, and Molly is the slave.
Tanty, I could curse thee for thy officiousness, from the tip of thy coal black wig to the sole of thy platter shoe--but that I am too good to curse thee at all!
Poor book of my life that I was so eager to fill in, that was to have held a narrative all thrilling, and all varied, now will I set forth in thee, my failure, my hopelessness, and after that close thee for ever.
Of what use indeed to chronicle, when there is nought to tell but flatness, chill monotony, on every side; when even the workings of my soul cannot interest me to follow, since they can now foreshadow nothing, lead to nothing but fruitless struggle or tame resignation!