'For thou art my Father,' said Venetia, 'I have no other father
but thee, O God! Forgive me, then, my heavenly parent, if in my
wilfulness, if in my thoughtless and sinful blindness, I have sighed
for a father on earth, as well as in heaven! Great have thy mercies
been to me, O God! in a mother's love. Turn, then, again to me the
heart of that mother whom I have offended! Let her look upon her child
as before; let her continue to me a double parent, and let me pay to
her the duty and the devotion that might otherwise have been divided!'
'Amen!' said a sweet and solemn voice; and Venetia was clasped in her
mother's arms.
CHAPTER III.
If the love of Lady Annabel for her child were capable of increase, it
might have been believed that it absolutely became more profound and
ardent after that short-lived but painful estrangement which we have
related in the last chapter. With all Lady Annabel's fascinating
qualities and noble virtues, a fine observer of human nature enjoying
opportunities of intimately studying her character, might have
suspected that an occasion only was wanted to display or develop in
that lady's conduct no trifling evidence of a haughty, proud, and even
inexorable spirit. Circumstanced as she was at Cherbury, with no one
capable or desirous of disputing her will, the more gracious and
exalted qualities of her nature were alone apparent.
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