“My conduct, uncle, during my aunt’s and your absence from home, has been and shall ever be open to the inspection of all your household.  I am too well aware that I am undeserving of your confidence, but I appeal to Ellis, on whose fidelity I know you rely, to prove to you in this case you suspect me unjustly.”  The last word was audible, but that was all, and, deeply pained, Ellen retired to her own room, which she did not quit, even to see her favourite cousin decked for the ball.  Emmeline sought her, however, and tried by kisses to recall the truant rose, the banished smile, but Mrs. Hamilton did not come to wish her good night, and Ellen’s heart was heavy.

Some few days passed, and Mrs. Hamilton accepted three several invitations without again expressing her wishes, but though the subject was not resumed, equal perplexity existed in the minds of both aunt and niece.  Ellen did not accuse Mrs. Hamilton of unkindness, but she could not fail to perceive that she no longer retained her confidence, and that knowledge painfully distressed the orphan’s easily excited feelings.  Another circumstance gave additional pain; her strange and apparently capricious behaviour had been casually mentioned to Herbert, and he, aware that his advice was always acceptable to Ellen, ventured to remonstrate with her, and playfully to reason her out of what he termed her extraordinary fancy for seclusion.  Some indefinable sensation ever prevented Ellen from speaking or writing to Herbert as she would have done to any other member of the family, but she answered him, acknowledging she deserved his hinted reproach, but owning that she could not change her conduct, even in compliance with his request; nevertheless, it grieved her much to know that he, whose approbation she unconsciously but ardently wished to gain, should believe her the capricious, unaccountable being it was evident he did:  still she persevered.  These, and whatever more she might have to endure, were but petty trials, to which her secretly chastened mind might bend but should not weakly bow.  She knew, if her aunt were conscious of her attention, much as perhaps she might approve of the motive, she would deem it a needless sacrifice, and probably prohibit its continuance; or, if she permitted and encouraged it, the merit of her action would no longer exist, nor could she indeed, while in the enjoyment of praise, have finished a task, commenced and carried on purely for the sake of duty, and as an atonement for the past, by the sacrifice of inclination, make peace with the gracious God she had offended.  Petty trials were welcome then, for if she met them with a Christian temper, a Christian spirit, she might hope that, whatever she might endure, she was progressing in His paths, “whose ways are pleasantness, and whose paths are peace;” could she but remove the lingering displeasure and distrust of her aunt and uncle, she would be quite happy.

It so happened that Emmeline’s next engagement was to the Opera, which was always Ellen’s greatest conquest of inclination.  She had amused herself by superintending her cousin’s dressing, and a sigh so audibly escaped, that Emmeline instantly exclaimed—­