Weaker than a Woman — page 109: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

. . a - by * * Boy ot pie aaa Ae _ ~ > pete we iis e - a” ws . "ad j + ae , a, e « . + % ego ; ". oe -. Ye ges fae WEAKER THAN A WOMAN. thought of the possibility that she might eventually be Lady Chevenix. The temptation was great and subtle; it was. some time in forcing an entrance into her heart—but, once admitted, it would not leave her. There were many ex- cuses for her—there was much that pleaded for her—her youth, her love of luxury, her dread of poverty, her long- ing for the bright side of life. The constant dropping of water wears away a stone. Such was Violet’s case. The constant talk of poverty with which her mother plied her morning, noon, and night—the constant praise of Sir Owen, the blank, cool toleration of Felix—the wonder at the > riches of the one, the pity for the poverty of the other, all influenced her, until at length a day came when her heart opened to the worship of Mammon, when love dwindled into insignificance by the side of wealth. The day came when, wearied of everything, she went out into the cool green depths of the summer woods and held her life, as it were, in her hands. She tried to think of her case as though it were that of a stranger—as though she herself had no vital concern in it. On the one side she had to suppose that she would prove true to her promise, true to her word—that she would marry the man whom she really loved—Hfelix Lonsdale. ‘Let me look at that picture quite calmly at first,” she said to herself. She would have to wait at least two or three years longer, and by then the brightness of her beauty would have waned—the spring of her youth would have left her. They would be years of sorry discomfort, too. Her mother and father would lose all patience; they would be years of constant unpleasantness; Felix, too, would doubtless be always in trouble—and she, like most of the young, gay, and beautiful, dreaded trouble. Taking the marriage at its best, it was a poor one. When she was first engaged to Felix Lonsdale, things were quite different. No cloud of disgrace hung over his family; he bade fair to become a rich man; he had every hope of making a beauti: ful home for her. Even then it was not such a marriage as she with her queenly dower of beauty and grace had a right to expect. Were she to marry him with his present prospects, what a fate would lie before her! Such limited means—such genteel poverty! She shuddered as she saw the years stretch themselves out before her. She foresaw hard work—the work she disliked most of all, domestic drudgery; hard fare; no balls, no parties, but little dress, nothing but the care of a house—a bare plain existence from which she shrunk—no visiting. How people would oe comicbooks.com |