The Works of George W. M. Reynolds — page 303: what you’re looking at

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

286 REYNOLDS’ WORKS self to Juliana, he would only be too glad to sacrifice some little rent by being enabled to return into Spain and bear his bride to his ancestral home at an earlier period than the term for which they hired the villa residence. The Countess of Toledo did not love her husband in the proper meaning of the term; hers was a heart totally un- fitted for a pure and virtuous affection. Whatsoever feeling she experienced at all akin to love was one of the sense and not of the sentiment. It was intertwined with the gross cravings of her temperament, and the attachment which she bore for the count was precisely the same which in her licentiousness she would have bestowed upon a paramour. Her feeling for Francis Paton had been of the same character, but more furious and frenetic in its devouring regards, be- cause he was the first by whom her sensuousness was grati- fied. The Viscount de Chateauneuf she had loved much less, because her designs in respect to him were based upon a worldly-minded selfishness, and when these were disap- pointed, she could as readily hate and detest as ever she had hked him. ‘The Count de Toledo was the object of her sensuous regards; she was also the more pleased with him the better she knew him on account of his good-nature and the manliness of his spirit, which qualities invariably secure the esteem of every kind and class of women. But, on the other hand, he was much attached to her. It is certain that he had espoused her not with the idea that she possessed any pecuniary means of importance, because she had not de- ceived him on that point; nor, indeed, when estimating their immediate resources, had he for a single instant taken into calculation or made the slightest allusion to any funds which she might in ease of emergency obtain from her mother. But he liked her for herself alone. She was remarkably handsome. Since her confinement her charms had expanded into a richer exuberance than even that which they before possessed, and being a creature of luxurious temperament, she was well calculated to please the fervid Spaniard. There was something, too, in the polish of her manners and the easy elegance of her deportment which might be supposed to exercise no ordinary influence upon the rougher nature of her husband. She spoke French fluently: this was the lan- guage in which they were accustomed to converse, and, being intelligent as well as accomplished, Juliana could render her _ CONMCOOOKS (E(0)