Weaker than a Woman — page 20: what you’re looking at

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

WEAKER THAN A WOMAN. oa: not that she was tall and slender, with a perfect figure ; it was not that she had white hands that wove wondrous spells, that she moved with grace that was all harmony, that she spoke with a voice sweeter than sweet music; that, when she laughed, the silvery chime stirred a man’s heart like the sound of silver bells; it was not for this that men loved her.- She. was not a flirt, not a coquette—she never, by word or looks, made any man believe that she loved =~ him; but she could no more have helped the way she had of charming men than she could have helped living. She was the only child of Francis and Margaret Haye, who lived in a pretty villa called the Limes, on the outskirts of Lilford. By kind indulgence the Hayes were permitted to rank with the gentry. They were not poor, they were not professionals ; they were not in trade. Francis Haye had an income that kept his family in comfort, but it would cease at his death. He had insured his life for the benefit of his wife and child, and the money that would come to them from that insurance was all that he had to leave them ; still they belonged to the gentry. It was not a numerous class in Lilford, and was by no means to be identified with county society ; that was a far-off and greater glory—a world that even beautiful Violet with her Greuze-like face had never hoped to enter. The gentry comprised old Colonel Maddox ~ and his lady ; Mrs. Brownson, a widow lady with a daughter of uncertain age; the late rector’s widow, Mrs. Boulders; — a maiden lady, Miss Stanley, the pride of whose life was that her second cousin had married a baronet, and who, in consequence, piqued herself on her high connections, and talked in a similar way of the aristocracy; and a few others of the same caliber. It was not a brilliant circle, but to Violet Haye it was a world. If, of her numerous lovers she preferred one, it was Felix Lonsdale. It was an old story. He had certainly been her lover from the early age of seven. He had never thought of any one else; to him and for him the world was all Violet. In the sun’s rays shone Violet; the birds sang “Violet ;” no sweet flower bloomed that was as sweet as she. He had lived with this one thought; he had studied, worked, toiled—all for Violet, hoping that the day would come when he would be able to marry her. He had de- voted his life to this one object. Darcy Lonsdale had contrived to send his son to Oxford, and at Oxford he had distinguished himself as a scholar of no mean abilities; after that he had passed some time in London; and now he was with his father, sharing his ‘-comicbooks:co