He is the best fellow I know." "And this is the man papa, for no reason whatever, save from Percy's ill-natured opinion, has desired me to slight, to behave in a manner that, contrasted with former notice, must be madness itself; cruelty to him, after what has passed between us, and misery to me.

Surely, in such a case as this I am not compelled to obey.

When the general voice proclaims him other than they believe, am I to regard what is in itself a mystery?
If Percy had good reasons for writing against him to papa, for I am sure he must have done so, why did he not explain them, instead of treating me thus like a child, and standing forward as his accuser, when the whole world extols him?
Why are the dearest wishes of my heart to be destroyed merely by caprice?
Percy ever tried, even in childhood, to bid me to look up to him, and acknowledge his power, and thus he would prove it; but he will find himself mistaken.

When papa permits his judgment to be blinded by the insinuations of a mere boy, I no longer consider myself bound to obey him." Such was the tenor of Caroline's thoughts when alone, in the short interval, ere she descended to dinner--there was no ray of happiness; her heart had that day received a wound, nor could she derive comfort even from the knowledge that Lord Alphingham was expected.

She would not permit herself to think on Lord Henry's conversation.