She has had
several offers of marriage, but she entertains peculiar ideas about the
strength of passion and the sympathy of thought a man and woman ought
to feel for each other before they decide to spend a life-time together.
She does not think a man who has a good income, and who is simply not
repulsive or abhorrent to her, a sufficient inducement.
The days wear on. Virginia does not forget Mr. Vansittart any more than
he forgets her, but he weighs more on her heart than she does on his,
for, happy man! he is perpetually occupied, being a barrister with a
considerable practice, whilst she is an idle woman as the well-to-do of
her sex mostly are. If she goes to balls or dances, she is always
contrasting every man, with whom she talks or dances, with him; if she
works at her embroidery, her thoughts are intent on him; if she reads, a
hero of her own ousts the hero of the novel from her brain; if she
sings, her voice is moved to strong pathos; her eyes become drowned by
that strange passion which consumes her. Days and weeks pass by; and she
does not catch a glimpse of him; does not even hear his name. She sees
it frequently in the _Times_. One Sunday afternoon, she and her uncle
strolling in the Park meet him. He lifts his hat, and is about to pass,
when something that her eyes have communicated to his heart, stops him
suddenly.
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