Nor was she altogether free from a sense of blame in the matter.

Had she been less imperative in her mood and bearing, more ready to give than to require sympathy,--but ah! she could not change the past, and the present was calling upon her.
At length the towers of Raglan appeared, and a pang of apprehension shot through her bosom.

She was approaching the unknown.

Like one on the verge of a second-sight, her history seemed for a moment about to reveal itself--where it lay, like a bird in its egg, within those massive walls, warded by those huge ascending towers.

Brought up in a retirement that some would have counted loneliness, and although used to all gentle and refined ways, yet familiar with homeliness and simplicity of mode and ministration, she could not help feeling awed at the prospect of entering such a zone of rank and stateliness and observance as the household of the marquis, who lived like a prince in expenditure, attendance, and ceremony.