Penny Blood Serial Fiction — page 322: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE ENAMOURED SQUIRE 300 it would not be delicate or proper to manifest precipitation in such a case. The month, however, had now drawn to a close. It was in the middle of July when the Denisons’ ball took place; it was now the middle of August, and Mr. Hawkshaw hailed with delight the termination of the inter- val which he had imposed upon himself as a period of pre- liminary wooing. But did Juliana ever think of Francis Paton? Yes, she was constantly devouring him, as it were, with all the in- tense fervour of her sensuous nature. The image of that beautiful youth was always uppermost in her mind, and when alone she revolved a thousand schemes for the grat- ification of her passion after the ceremony of marriage with Mr. Hawkshaw should have furnished a cloak for her pro- ceedings. She determined, as soon as convenient and practi- cable after the nuptial ceremony, to adopt some measures to bring Francis into the neighbourhood. Might she not manage to introduce him as a page into Hawkshaw Hall, - when she should become the mistress of that establishment? Or might she not secrete him at some humble but respectable dwelling in the neighbourhood, so that she might see him frequently and under circumstances of proper precaution? She did not entertain the slightest feeling of affection for Mr. Hawkshaw; she only received his addresses and purposed to accept him as a husband to suit her own selfish views. She wanted an established position, she wanted to separate from a mother whom she regarded with mistrust, aversion, and every feeling that was different from respect and venera- tion, she wanted also the means and opportunity of in- dulging her licentious passion for young Paton. But did she therefore love Frank in reality? The feeling she ex- perienced for him she regarded as love, but it would be dese- erating that pure and hallowed sentiment to affirm that it was a true and genuine love which fanned those devouring fires in the heart of Juliana Farefield. It was a fervid passion, but not a real love; it was a feeling of the sense, and not a sentiment; it fed upon the gross aliment of hot desire, and not upon the sweet manna of chaste and hallowed reflections. Had she really loved him in the true meaning of the term, she would have flown in the face of the world to become his wife, even while he was the humble and obscure page; she would have set at defiance all the con- CORVICLOO® Ss (C(O)