Chapter 44 - Page 2

visitors, and many of them were ladies. To
these, the arrival of the unmarried heir of the house of Derwent was a
subject of no little interest. His character had, however, preceded him,
and a few days of his awkward and, as they conceived, sullen deportment,
drove them back to their former beaux, with the exception of one; and she
was not only amongst the fairest of the throng, but decidedly of the
highest pretensions on the score of birth and fortune.

Marian Lumley was the only surviving child of the last Duke of Annerdale,
with whom had expired the higher honors of his house. But the Earldom of
Pendennyss, with numerous ancient baronies, were titles in fee; and
together with his princely estates had descended to his daughter as
heir-general of the family. A peeress in her own right, with an income far
exceeding her utmost means of expenditure, the lovely Countess of
Pendennyss was a prize aimed at by all the young nobles of the empire.

Educated in the midst of flatterers and dependants she had become haughty,
vain, and supercilious; still she was lovely, and no one knew better how
to practise the most winning arts of her sex, when whim or interest
prompted her to the trial.

Her host was her guardian and relative; and through his agency she had
rejected, at the age of twenty, numerous suitors for her hand. Her eyes
were fixed on the ducal coronet; and unfortunately for Francis Denbigh, he
was, at the time, the only man of the proper age who could elevate her to
that enviable distinction in the kingdom; and an indirect measure of her
own had been the means of his invitation to the country.

Like the rest of her young companions, Marian was greatly disappointed on
the view of her intended captive, and for a day or two she abandoned him
to his melancholy and himself. But ambition was her idol; and to its
powerful rival, love, she was yet a stranger. After a few struggles with
her inclinations the consideration that their united fortunes and family
alliances would make one of the wealthiest and most powerful houses in the
kingdom, prevailed. Such early sacrifices of the inclinations in a woman
of her beauty, youth and accomplishments, may excite surprise; but where
the mind is left uncultivated by the hand of care, the soul untouched by
the love of goodness, the human heart seldom fails to set up an idol of
its own to worship. In the Countess of Pendennyss this idol was pride.

The remainder of the ladies, from ceasing to wonder at the manners of
Francis, had made them the subject of their mirth; and nettled at his
apparent indifference to their society, which they erroneously attributed
to his sense of his importance, they overstepped the bounds of
good-breeding in manifesting their displeasure.