Then she saw that her anticipations
were all wrong--he preferred his dead ancestors to his living wife.
She went back to Winiston House and took up the dreary round of life
again. She might have made her lot more endurable and happier, she might
have traveled, have sought society and amusement; but she had no heart
for any of these things. She had spent the year and a half of her lonely
married life in profound study, thinking to herself that if he should
claim her he would be pleased to find her yet more accomplished and
educated. She was indefatigable, and it was all for him.
Now that she was going back, she was without this mainspring of
hope--her old studies and pursuits wearied her. To what end and for what
purpose had been all her study, all her hard work? He would never know
of her proficiency; and she would not care to study for any other object
than to please him.
"What am I to do with my life," she moaned. "Mariana in the moated
grange was not more to be pitied than I."
How often the words occurred to her:
"The day is dreary,
'He cometh not,' she said:
She said, 'I am aweary, aweary,
would that I were dead.
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