I am the most
wretched, wretched creature!"--here again she burst into an agony of
uncontrollable grief.
* * * * *
Who can describe the feelings of the Lady Anne--alone, in her chamber,
looking up at the portrait of her mother, upon which she had so often
gazed with delight and reverence! "Is it possible?" said she to
herself, "can this be she, of whom I have read such dreadful things?
Have all my young and happy days been but a dream, from which I wake
at last? Is not this dreadful certainty still as a hideous dream to
me?"
She had another cause of bitter grief. She loved the young and
noble-minded Lord Russell, the Earl of Bedford's eldest son; and she
had heard him vow affection and faithfulness to her. She now perceived
at once the reasons why the Earl of Bedford had objected to their
marriage: she almost wondered within herself that the Lord Russel
should have chosen her; and though she loved him more for avowing his
attachment, though her heart pleaded warmly for him, she determined to
renounce his plighted love. "It must be done," she said, "and better
now;--delay will but bring weakness. _Now_ I can write--I feel that I
have strength.
Pages:
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64