The tender care and good nursing which had been lavished on Marie, had
restored her sufficiently to health as to permit returning elasticity
of mind. All morbid agony had passed, all too passionate emotions were
gradually relaxing their fire-bands round her heart; and strength, the
martyr strength, for which she unceasingly prayed, to give up all if
called upon for her God, seemed dawning for her. That she was still
under some restraint, a sort of prisoner in the palace, Marie herself
was not aware; she had neither wish nor energy to leave the castle,
and therefore knew not that her egress, save under watchful
guardianship, would have been denied. She had no spirits to mingle
with the light-hearted, happy girls, in her Sovereign's train, and
therefore was unconscious that, with the sole exception of Catherine
whose passionate entreaties had obtained her this privilege, all
intimacy with them would have been effectually prevented. It was
enough, more than enough (for the foreboding dread was ever present,
that such a blissful calm, such mental and bodily repose, were far,
far too sweet for any long continuance) to be employed in little
services for and about the person of the Queen, and to know that
Arthur Stanley was restored to even more than former favor, and fast
rising to eminence and honor.
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