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such painful circumstances to be exposed to such insolence! It shall not be: I will not suffer it. (A thoughtful pause.) To affront a lady in my own house? Not to be thought of! To leave the country at once, and let the sea and its waves roll between us? Ay, this were well, were not all that is dear to me left behind;—my mother, my poor afflicted sister, my dear, dear Violet, the noble distressed Violet Murrey.—No; I will stay and contend with the termagant, as I would with an evil spirit. Had she the soul of a woman within her, though the plainest and meanest of her sex, I would pity and respect her; but as she is——O! shame upon it! she makes me as bad as herself. I know not what to do: I dare not enter yet.

[Exit the way by which he came.