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About this time Miss Milner had the humiliation of having Miss Fenton held up to her as a pattern for her to follow; but, instead of being inspired to emulation, she was provoked to envy. Young, beautiful, elegant, Miss Fenton was betrothed to Lord Elmwood, Mr. Dorriforth's cousin; and Dorriforth, whose heart was not formed--at least, not educated--for love, beheld in her the most perfect model for her sex.

Not to admire Miss Fenton was impossible. To find one fault with her was equally impossible, and yet to love her was unlikely. But Mr. Sandford, Dorriforth's old tutor, and rigid monitor and friend, adored her, and often, with a shake of his head and a sigh, would he say to Miss Milner, "No, I am not so hard upon you as your guardian. I only desire you to love Miss Fenton; to resemble her, I believe, is above your ability."

As a Jesuit, he was a man of learning, and knew the hearts of women as well as those of men. He saw Miss Milner's heart at the first view of her person, and beholding in that little circumference a weight of folly that he wished to eradicate, he began to toil in the vineyard, eagerly courting her detestation of him in the hope of also making her abominate herself. In the mortification of slights he was an expert, and humbled her in her own opinion more than a thousand sermons would have done. She would have been cured of all her pride had she not possessed a degree of spirit beyond the generality of her sex!

II.--The Priest Marries His Ward

Finding Dorriforth frequently perplexed by his guardianship, Mr. Sandford advised that a suitable match should immediately be sought for her; but she refused so many offers that, believing her affections were set upon Lord Frederick, he insisted that she should be taken into the country at once. Her ready compliance delighted Dorriforth, and for six weeks all around was the picture of tranquillity. Then Lord Frederick suddenly appeared at the door as she alighted from her coach, and seizing her hand, entreated her "not to desert him in compliance with the injunctions of monkish hypocrisy."

Dorriforth heard this, standing silently by, with a manly scorn upon his countenance; but on Miss Milner's struggling to release her hand, which Lord Frederick was devouring with kisses, with an instantaneous impulse he rushed forward and struck him a violent blow in the face. Then, leading her to her own chamber, covered with shame and confusion for what he had done, he fell on his knees before her, and earnestly "entreated her forgiveness for the indelicacy he had been guilty of in her presence."

To see her guardian at her feet struck her with a sense of impropriety as if she had seen a parent there. All agitation and emotion, she implored him to rise, and, with a thousand protestations, declared "that she thought the rashness of his action was the highest proof of his regard for her."

Finding that Lord Frederick had gone when he had resigned the care of his ward to Miss Woodley, Dorriforth returned to his own apartment with a bosom torn by excruciating sensations. He had departed from his sacred character, and the dignity of his profession and sentiments; he had treated with unpardonable insult a young nobleman whose only offence was love; he had offended and filled with horror a beautiful young woman whom it was his duty to protect from those brutal manners to which he himself had exposed her.

The outcome of this incident was a duel, to prevent which Miss Milner deceived him by confessing a passion for Lord Frederick, although to Miss Woodley she avowed the real truth, that it was Dorriforth she loved.

"Do you suppose I love Lord Frederick? Do you suppose I can love him? Oh, fly, and prevent my guardian from telling him this untruth! This duel is horrible even beyond anything else! Oh, Miss Woodley, pity the agonies of my heart, my heart by nature sincere, when such are the fatal propensities it cherishes that I must submit to the grossest falsehoods rather than reveal the truth! Are you so blind," she exclaimed, "as to believe I do not care for Mr. Dorriforth? Oh, Miss Woodley, I love him with all the passion of a woman, and with all the tenderness of a wife!"

"Silence!" cried Miss Woodley, struck with horror. Yet, amidst all her grief and abhorrence, pity was still predominant, and, seeing her friend's misery, she did all she could to comfort her. But she was resolved that she should leave home, and, on pain of revealing her secret to Mr. Dorriforth, induced her to pay a visit of indefinite length to her friends at Bath.

There, in the melancholy that possessed her, Miss Woodley's letters alone gave her consolation. In a short time her health became impaired; she was once in imminent danger, and during her delirium incessantly repeated her guardian's name. Miss Woodley journeyed to her at once, and so did Dorriforth, who, through the death of his cousin, Lord Elmwood, had acquired his title and estates. On this account he had received a dispensation from his vow of celibacy, and was enjoined to marry. His ward felt a pleasure so exquisite on hearing this that the agitation of mind and person brought with it the sensation of exquisite pain; but, to her cruel grief, she found that he was, on the advice of his friends, already paying his addresses to Miss Fenton.