as to the duty and benefit of struggling against affliction,
which had naturally grown out of their conversation.
For, though shy, he did not seem reserved; it had
rather the appearance of feelings glad to burst their
usual restraints; and having talked of poetry, the
richness of the present age, and gone through a brief
comparison of opinion as to the first-rate poets,
trying to ascertain whether Marmion or The Lady of
the Lake were to be preferred, and how ranked the Giaour
and The Bride of Abydos; and moreover, how the Giaour
was to be pronounced, he showed himself so intimately
acquainted with all the tenderest songs of the one
poet, and all the impassioned descriptions of hopeless
agony of the other; he repeated, with such tremulous
feeling, the various lines which imaged a broken heart,
or a mind destroyed by wretchedness, and looked so
entirely as if he meant to be understood, that she
ventured to hope he did not always read only poetry,
and to say, that she thought it was the misfortune
of poetry to be seldom safely enjoyed by those who
enjoyed it completely; and that the strong feelings
which alone could estimate it truly were the very
feelings which ought to taste it but sparingly.
His looks shewing him not pained, but pleased with
this allusion to his situation, she was emboldened
to go on; and feeling in herself the right of seniority
of mind, she ventured to recommend a larger allowance
of prose in his daily study; and on being requested
to particularize, mentioned such works of our best
moralists, such collections of the finest letters,
such memoirs of characters of worth and suffering,
as occurred to her at the moment as calculated to
rouse and fortify the mind by the highest precepts,
and the strongest examples of moral and religious endurances.
Captain Benwick listened attentively, and seemed grateful
for the interest implied; and though with a shake
of the head, and sighs which declared his little faith
in the efficacy of any books on grief like his, noted
down the names of those she recommended, and promised
to procure and read them.
When the evening was over, Anne could not but be amused
at the idea of her coming to Lyme to preach patience
and resignation to a young man whom she had never
seen before; nor could she help fearing, on more serious
reflection, that, like many other great moralists
and preachers, she had been eloquent on a point in
which her own conduct would ill bear examination.
Anne and Henrietta, finding themselves the earliest
of the party the next morning, agreed to stroll down
to the sea before breakfast. They went to the
sands, to watch the flowing of the tide, which a fine
south-easterly breeze was bringing in with all the
grandeur which so flat a shore admitted. They
praised the morning; gloried in the sea; sympathized
in the delight of the fresh-feeling breeze—and
were silent; till Henrietta suddenly began again with—
