In her intercourse with refined and intellectual persons, Mrs. Dexter had made the acquaintance of a lady named Mrs. De Lisle.  Her residence was not far from Mrs. Dexter’s and they met often for pleasant and profitable conversation.  In Mrs. De Lisle, Mrs. Dexter found a woman of not only superior attainments, but one possessing great purity of mind, and a high religious sense of duty.  What struck her in the very beginning was a new mode of weighing human actions, and a quiet looking beneath the surface of things, and estimating all she saw by the quality within instead of by the appearance without.  From the first, Mrs. Dexter was strongly attracted by this lady; and it was a little remarkable that her husband was as strongly repelled.  He did not like her; and often spoke of her sneeringly as using an unknown tongue.  His wife contended with him slightly at first in regard to Mrs. De Lisle; but soon ceased to notice his captious remarks.

In Mrs. De Lisle, the struggling and suffering young creature had found a true friend—­not true in the sense of a weakly, sympathizing friend, but more really true; one who could lift her soul up into purer regions, and help it to acquire strength for duty.

There was another lady named Mrs. Anthony who had insinuated herself into the good opinion of Mrs. Dexter, and partially, also, into her confidence.

It does not take a quick-sighted woman long to comprehend the true marital standing of the friend in whom she feels an interest.  Both Mrs. De Lisle and Mrs. Anthony soon discovered that no love was in the heart of Mrs. Dexter, and that consequently, no interior marriage existed.  They saw also that Mr. Dexter was inferior, selfish, captious at times, and kept his wife always under surveillance, as if afraid of her constancy.  The different conduct of the ladies, touching this relation of Mrs. Dexter to her husband, was in marked contrast.  While Mrs. De Lisle never approached the subject in a way to invite communication, Mrs. Anthony, in the most adroit and insinuating manner, almost compelled a certain degree of confidence—­or at least admission that there was not and never could be, any interior conjunction between herself and husband.

Mrs. Anthony was a highly intellectual and cultivated woman, with fascinating manners, a strong will, and singularly fine conversational powers.  She usually exercised a controlling influence over all with whom she associated.  Happy it was for Mrs. Dexter that a friend like Mrs. De Lisle came to her in the right time, and filled her mind with right principles for her own pure instincts to rest upon as an immovable foundation.