As they walked on, there was a certain degree of embarrassment hung over both Wilton and Laura; both felt, perhaps, that they could be very happy in each other’s society, but both felt afraid of being too happy.  With Wilton, there were a thousand causes to produce that slight embarrassment, and with Lady Laura several also.  But one, and a very principal cause was, that there was something which she longed exceedingly to say, and yet doubted whether she ought to say it.

It does not unfrequently happen that a person of the highest rank and station, possessing every quality to secure friendship, with wealth and every gift of fortune at command, surrounded by numerous acquaintances, and mingling with a wide society, is nevertheless totally alone—­alone in spirit and in heart—­alone in thought and mind.  Such was the case with Lady Laura.  It is true she had yet but very little experience of the world, and her search for a congenial spirit had not been carried far or prosecuted long; but she was one of those who had learned to think and to feel early.  Her mother, who had died three years before, had taught her to do so, not alone for her own sake, but also for that of her father; for the Duchess had early felt the conviction that her own life would be brief, and knew that the mind and character of her daughter must have a great effect upon the Duke, whom she loved much, though she could not venerate very highly.

With a heart, then, full of deep and pure feelings, with a mind not only originally bright and strong, not only highly cultivated and stored with fine tastes, but highly directed and fortified with strong principles, with an enthusiastic love of everything that was beautiful and graceful, generous, noble, and dignified—­it is not to be wondered at that, in the wide society of the capital, or amongst all the acquaintances who thronged her father’s house, Lady Laura had seen no spirit congenial to her own, no heart with the same feelings, no mind with the same objects.  In every one she had met with, there had still been some apparent weakness, some worldliness, some selfishness; there had been coldness, or apathy, or want of principle, or want of feeling; and the bright enthusiasms of her young nature had been confined to the tabernacle of her own heart.

She had seen Wilton Brown but seldom, it is true, but nevertheless she felt differently towards him and other people.  There were several causes which had produced this; and perhaps, as Lady Laura was not absolutely an angel, his personal appearance might have something to do with it, though less than might be supposed.  His fine person, his noble carriage, his bright and intelligent countenance, the rapid variety of its expressions, the dignified character of the predominant one to which it always returned, after those more transient had passed away—­all gave the idea of there being a high heart and mind beneath.  In the next place, Wilton had, as we