Something of the renovating influence of a beautiful nature
was needed by the daughter of Gerard. She was at this moment
anxious and dispirited. The outbreak at Birmingham, the
conviction that such proceedings must ultimately prove fatal
to the cause to which she was devoted, the dark apprehension
that her father was in some manner implicated in this
movement, that had commenced with so much public disaster, and
which menaced consequences still more awful, all these events,
and fears, and sad forebodings, acted with immense influence
on a temperament which, though gifted with even a sublime
courage, was singularly sensitive. The quick and teeming
imagination of Sybil conjured up a thousand fears which were
in some degree unfounded, in a great degree exaggerated, but
this is the inevitable lot of the creative mind practising on
the inexperienced.
The shock too had been sudden. The two months that had
elapsed since she had parted, as she supposed for ever, from
Egremont, while they had not less abounded than the preceding
time in that pleasing public excitement which her father's
career, in her estimation alike useful, honourable, and
distinguished, occasioned her, had been fruitful in some
sources of satisfaction of a softer and more domestic
character.
Pages:
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
491
492