Chapter 24 - Page 2

he is, ma'am--"

"You mean a less modest, Nanny," said Eve, perceiving that her nurse
paused.

"Yes, ma'am--one that thought more of himself, and less of other
people, is what I wish to say."

"And were this the case?"

"I might think _he_ would find the heart to say what I know he
feels."

"And did he find the heart to say what you know he feels, what does
Ann Sidley think should be my answer?"

"Oh, ma'am, I know it would be just as it ought to be. I cannot
repeat what ladies say on such occasions, but I know that it is what
makes the hearts of the gentlemen leap for joy."

There are occasions in which woman can hardly dispense with the
sympathy of woman. Eve loved her father most tenderly, had more than
the usual confidence in him, for she had never known a mother; but
had the present conversation been with him, notwithstanding all her
reliance on his affection, her nature would have shrunk from pouring
out her feelings as freely as she might have done with her other
parent, had not death deprived her of such a blessing. Between our
heroine and Ann Sidley, on the other hand, there existed a confidence
of a nature so peculiar, as to require a word of explanation before
we exhibit its effects. In all that related to physical wants, Ann
had been a mother, or even more than a mother to Eve, and this alone
had induced great personal dependence in the one, and a sort of
supervisory care in the other, that had brought her to fancy she was
responsible for the bodily health and well-doing of her charge. But
this was not all. Nanny had been the repository of Eve's childish
griefs, the confidant of her girlish secrets; and though the years of
the latter soon caused her to be placed under the management of those
who were better qualified to store her mind, this communication never
ceased; the high-toned and educated young woman reverting with
unabated affection, and a reliance that nothing could shake, to the
long-tried tenderness of the being who had watched over her infancy.
The effect of such an intimacy was often amusing; the one party
bringing to the conferences, a mind filled with the knowledge suited
to her sex and station, habits that had been formed in the best
circles of christendom, and tastes that had been acquired in schools
of high reputation; and the other, little more than her single-
hearted love, a fidelity that ennobled her nature, and a simplicity
that betokened perfect purity of thought Nor was this extraordinary
confidence without its advantages to Eve; for, thrown so early among
the artificial and calculating, it served to keep her own
ingenuousness of character active, and prevented