Her belief
stopped short even of the Deist's faith in an Almighty Will. She saw in
creation nothing but the inevitable development of material laws; and it
seemed to her that there was quite as much hope of a heavenly world
after death for the infusoria in the pool as for man in his pride and
power.
She read her Bible as diligently as she read her Shakespeare, and the
words of the Royal Preacher in some measure embodied her own dreary
creed. And now, in the darkening winter day, she watched the gloomy
shadows creep over the rugged breast of Nabb Scar, and she thought how
there was a time for all things, and that her day of hope and ambition
was past.
Of late years she had lived for Lesbia, looking forward to the day when
she was to introduce this beloved grandchild to the great world of
London; and now that hope was gone for ever.
What could a helpless cripple do for a fashionable beauty? What good
would it be for her to be conveyed to London, and to lie on a couch in
Mayfair, while Lesbia rode in the Row and went to three or four parties
every night with a more active chaperon?
She had hoped to go everywhere with her darling, to glory in all her
successes, to shield her from all possibility of failure.
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