"She kept her feelings entirely to herself; but if any one could have divined them and shared them with her, he could not have blamed her: for indeed the bridegroom could not sustain a comparison with the other as soon as they were seen together. If a sort of regard to the one could not be refused, the other excited the fullest trust and confidence. If one made an agreeable acquaintance, the other we should desire for a companion; and in extraordinary cases, where higher demands might have to be made on them, the bridegroom was a person to be utterly despaired of, while the other would give the feeling of perfect security.
"There is a peculiar innate tact in women which discovers to them differences of this kind; and they have cause as well as occasion to cultivate it.
"The more the fair bride was nourishing all these feelings in secret, the less opportunity there was for any one to speak a word which could tell in favor of her bridegroom, to remind her of what her duty and their relative position advised and commanded--indeed, what an unalterable necessity seemed now irrevocably to require; the poor heart gave itself up entirely to its passion.
"On one side she was bound inextricably to the bridegroom by the world, by her family, and by her own promise; on the other, the ambitious young man made no secret of what he was thinking and planning for himself, conducting himself toward her no more than a kind but not at all a tender brother, and speaking of his departure as immediately impending; and now it seemed as if her early childish spirit woke up again in her with all its spleen and violence, and was preparing itself in its distemper, on this higher stage of life, to work more effectively and destructively. She determined that she would die to punish the once hated; and now so passionately loved, youth for his want of interest in her; and as she could not possess himself, at least she would wed herself for ever to his imagination and to his repentance. Her dead image should cling to him, and he should never be free from it. He should never cease to reproach himself for not having understood, not examined, not valued her feelings toward him.
"This singular insanity accompanied her wherever she went. She kept it concealed under all sorts of forms; and although people thought her very odd, no one was observant enough or clever enough to discover the real inward reason.