It is a lovely
blindness in a child to have no discernment of a parent's faultiness;
and so it happened that the Lady Anne saw nothing in her father's mien
or manner, betokening a sinful, worthless character.
Of her mother she had but few and faint recollections. Memory pictured
her pale and drooping, nay gradually sinking under the cureless malady
which brought her to her grave at last. She remembered, however,
the soft and beautiful smiles which had beamed over that haggard
countenance, when it was turned upon her only child--smiles which she
delighted to recognise in the lovely portrait, from which her idea of
her mother was chiefly formed. This portrait adorned her own favourite
apartment. It had been painted when the original was as young and
happy as herself; and her filial love and fond imagination believed no
grace had been wanting to make all as beautiful and glorious within.
As the Lady Anne grew up to womanhood, the sweetness of her
disposition and manners began to be acknowledged by those, who had
seen without astonishment her extraordinary beauty; and many persons
of distinction, who would hold no kind of fellowship with the Lord
Somerset, sought the acquaintance of his innocent daughter for her
own sake.
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