3

Murray’s displeasure soon yielded to tenderer emotion, and weeping anew, she lamented her sad condition—without a home of her own in which she could receive her returning prodigal. Mary soothed her agitation, and when the servant entered to spread the table for dinner, withdrew more perplexed than ever.
The purity of Mary’s mind had never been tarnished by association with vice, even under its most seductive form of elegance and fashion. The license allowed to married women in the higher circles, where the European system of gallantry is insidiously undermining the morals, and transforming the simple and rigid forms of our society, was unknown to those secluded, but lovely women. She could not have comprehended had she heard the term of Married Belle, now so commonly in use in fashionable circles, or had it been explained, she would have revolted from the idea, as one allied with guilt and shame. Flirtation of a married woman! — her lovers! — such things she had never heard of in our country, though she had read of them as existing in the licentious courts of Europe—these, however, were so remote that she felt them not as realities, but thought of them rather as fictions, and shrunk from them as profanations, not only of purity but of truth.
Unacquainted with the world, on whose theatre the passions play such tremendous parts; unacquainted even with their inseperable existence with human nature, she was the more exposed to their assaults.
A garrison, aware of the enemies by which it is beleagured, might avert the threatened attack by prudence and vigilance, when, though brave and faithful, it might be lost from mere ignorance of its danger and a reliance on its supposed security.
Loved from childhood, the pure and. placid affections of Mary’s bosom had never been perturbed by strong or powerful emotions. Yet her nature was as ardent as it was tender and susceptible; and to love and be beloved, seemed as necessary to her life as to her happiness. Love was her natural element, the only one on which she could live; from coldness and unkindness she suffered, as a tropical plant would do if transplanted to the polar regions. Keenly did she feel the reproaches of her mother-in-law — she felt they were undeserved—that when she avoidaed the society of Charles, the solicitations of her own heart had been sacrificed to an instinctive sense of duty—a feeling which she scarecely understood, yet obeyed. But how explain to his mother feelings to herself incomprehensible.
“Hate Charles Lovel,” exclaimed Mary, as she entered her chamber, and threw herself into a large chair that stood by the window. “Hate Charles Lovel! I could almost wish I did. How is it possible his mother can be so deceived? But she suspects not—oh, she cannot suspect the too tender, too absorbing interest he has excited, and that my avoidance of him resulted form an instictive fear of danger. And yet, why this fear? His mother, my husband desire me to show him every kindness—to allure him by the charms of home, from the haunts of vice. Can a nobler task be asigned me? Whence then this internal consciousness of wrong? My children, my little darling, how comes it to pass that you do not conitnue to cccupy every thought, —that I do not feel the impatience and anxiety I used to feel when separated from you—that I can now contentedly resign you to the care of a hireling, and pass whole mornings—nay, sometimes whole days, without listening to your sweet prattle and your fond caresses! Whence is it that I no longer find the hours of separation from my husband tedious—that I no longer watch the clock, or run to the window to see if he is returning. Happy in the absence of my husband and children. There was a time when I would not have believed this to be possible. When is this change? Surely this is wrong—Strange! I am a mystery to myself. Dear little creatures, surely I do not love you less, why then cannot I find the same pleasure in giving you your lessons? I catch myself hurrying them over, sometimes, even, irritated by your playfulness and inattention. More impatient than yourselves to get through your morning tasks. Tasks! I did not use to call them tasks, they wer my chief delight. What means this? How is it possible that the society of a stranger can have a more powerful attraction for me than that of my children, for whom, without a moment’s hesitation, I would cheerfully suffer pain, or death itself, to save them from suffering. How my mind expands while I talk to him! — such floods of thought rush in, that it seems to me I could converse for days together without exhaustion of ideas. I feel as if my soul had been sleeping and that his voice, his look, had awaked the sleeper, and roused all its latent powers. And is there any thing wrong in this? my mother would answer no! Yet I feel it is not right! these feelings have prompted me to shun him. My avoidance, his mother says, may injure, may ruin him—then it must be wrong; what higher duty can I have than to save a fellow being from vice, not from suffering only, but from vice? Surely my duty here is plain, and yet, what—what shall I do?
“Searcher of hearts, direct, enlighten my bewildered mind; let they divine light guide my steps; thy divine strength fortify my mind.

If I am right thy grace impart,
Still in the right to stay,
If I am wrong, oh! teach my heart
To find the better way.”

Calmed and strengthened by this uplifting of her soul to the throne of grace—this feeling of God’s protecting power, she returned to the family circle, and yielding to the entreaties of Mrs. Murray, resumed her former intercourse with her son.
*. *. *. *
On Charles Lovel’s first arrival, the extravagant joy and affection exhibitied by his mother—the genuine affection and cordial warmth evinced by her husband, could not fail of impressing the mind of Mary with the most favourable of opinion of their new inmate. The pallidness and emaciation of his appearance, the deep dejection of his spirits, awakened a tender and generous compassion, which, independently of the express desires of her husband, prompted her to receive the stranger with the most marked kindness, and