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322
ETHEL CHURCHILL.

fancy, would soon have needed employ: the imaginative temperament, above all others, requires society and excitement, else it preys too much on itself.

The truth was, that she had received a violent shock, and it would be long before either mind or body recovered their ordinary tone: but this mournful calm was soon disturbed by letters from Lord Marchmont, urging her return. Week after week she delayed it, till at last he formally announced his intention of coming to fetch her himself. Henrietta's grief was renewed in all its passionate violence; leaving her uncle's grave was leaving himself; and yet so subdued was her spirit, by its long indulgence of sorrow, that she could not find in herself even energy enough for resistance. The week that was yet to elapse, she spent in wandering through her uncle's favourite walks in hours of tearful vigil, beside his tomb, and in collecting together every trifle on which he had set a value. Again and again did she repeat her directions that every thing should be left in their old-accustomed places;