Page:Glenarvon (Volume 2).djvu/298

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without a word being uttered on her part, left the room.

As soon as she was gone, the Duke approached his daughter. "This is going too far," he said, pointing to the letter: "there is no excuse for you." She asked him, with some vivacity, why he had broken the seal, and wherefore it was not delivered as it was addressed. With coldness he apologized to her for the liberty he had taken, which even a father's right over an only child, he observed, could scarcely authorise. "But," continued he, "duty has of late been so much sacrificed to inclination, that we must have charity for each other. As I came, however, by your letter somewhat unfairly, I shall make no comments upon it, nor describe the feelings that it excited in my mind—only observe, I will have this end here; and my commands, like your's, shall be obeyed." He then reproached her for her behaviour of late. "I have seen you give way," he said, "to exceeding low