"You, my gentle and timid Constance!" interrupted Henrietta.
"Ay, for years I lived in the wild worship of an earthly idol! I loved my cousin as those love whom nothing distracts from the one cherished object! I was solitary, neglected, debarred by my health from the ordinary pursuits of my age, but one image supplied the place of all others: I have passed hours thinking of Norbourne, till his own presence was scarcely more actual than my waking dream. I married him; and, for a time, forgot that earth was not heaven! I was too happy; and, as if I were to owe all to him whom I loved so utterly, my marriage gave me a share I never before possessed in my father's affection; and I found, too, that he was happier for loving me. I forgot all but this life: it shut out eternity. I cannot tell you how I awakened from my dream, for dream it was—so gradual, but so sad was my awakening. Too soon the subtle instinct of love told me that I was not to Norbourne what he was to me!"
