Chapter 4 - Page 2

philanthropy,
and as I was unwilling to admit the truth of theories that arrayed
me in open hostility against so large a portion of mankind, I soon
determined to set up one of my own, which, while it avoided the
faults, should include the excellences of both the others. It was,
of course, no great affair merely to form such a resolution; but I
shall have occasion to say a word hereafter on the manner in which I
attempted to carry it out in practice.

Time moved on, and Anna became each day more beautiful. I thought
that she had lost some of her frankness and girlish gayety, it is
true, after the dialogue with her father; but this I attributed to
the reserve and discretion that became the expanding reason and
greater feeling of propriety that adorn young womanhood. With me she
was always ingenuous and simple, and were I to live a thousand years
the angelic serenity of countenance with which she invariably
listened to the theories of my busy brain would not be erased from
recollection.

We were talking of these things one morning quite alone. Anna heard
me when I was most sedate with manifest pleasure, and she smiled
mournfully when the thread of my argument was entangled by a vagary
of the imagination. I felt at my heart's core what a blessing such a
mentor would be, and how fortunate would be my lot could I succeed
in securing her for life. Still I did not, could not, summon courage
to lay bare my inmost thoughts, and to beg a boon that in these
moments of transient humility I feared I never should be worthy to
possess.

"I have even thought of marrying," I continued--so occupied with my
own theories as not to weigh, with the accuracy that becomes the
frankness and superior advantages which man possesses over the
gentler sex, the full import of my words; "could I find one, Anna,
as gentle, as good, as beautiful, and as wise as yourself who would
consent to be mine, I should not wait a minute; but, unhappily, I
fear this is not likely to be my blessed lot. I am not the grandson
of a baronet, and your father expects to unite you with one who can
at least show that the 'bloody hand' has once been born on his
shield; and, on the other side, my father talks of nothing but
millions." During the first part of this speech the amiable girl
looked kindly up at me, and with a seeming desire to soothe me; but
at its close her eyes dropped upon her work and she remained silent.
"Your father says that every man who has an interest in the state
should give it pledges"--here Anna smiled, but so covertly that her
sweet mouth scarce betrayed the impulse--"and that none others can
ever control it to advantage. I have thought of asking my father to
buy a borough and a