Alice

Alice, or The Mysteries,
Complete
by Edward Bulwer
Lytton

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Title: Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete
Author: Edward Bulwer Lytton
Release Date: October 21, 2006 [EBook #9774]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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Produced by Dagny, and David Widger

ALICE;
OR,
THE MYSTERIES
BY
EDWARD BULWER LYTTON (LORD LYTTON)
COMPLETE

BOOK I.
"Thee, hid the bowering vales amidst, I call." --EURIPIDES: Hel. I.
1116.
CHAPTER I.
Who art thou, fair one, who usurp'st the place Of Blanch, the lady of
the matchless grace?--LAMB.
IT was towards the evening of a day in early April that two ladies were
seated by the open windows of a cottage in Devonshire. The lawn
before them was gay with evergreens, relieved by the first few flowers
and fresh turf of the reviving spring; and at a distance, through an
opening amongst the trees, the sea, blue and tranquil, bounded the view,
and contrasted the more confined and home-like features of the scene.
It was a spot remote, sequestered, shut out from the business and
pleasures of the world; as such it suited the tastes and character of the
owner.
That owner was the younger of the ladies seated by the window. You
would scarcely have guessed, from her appearance, that she was more
than seven or eight and twenty, though she exceeded by four or five
years that critical boundary in the life of beauty. Her form was slight
and delicate in its proportions, nor was her countenance the less lovely

because, from its gentleness and repose (not unmixed with a certain
sadness) the coarse and the gay might have thought it wanting in
expression. For there is a stillness in the aspect of those who have felt
deeply, which deceives the common eye,--as rivers are often alike
tranquil and profound, in proportion as they are remote from the
springs which agitated and swelled the commencement of their course,
and by which their waters are still, though invisibly, supplied.
The elder lady, the guest of her companion, was past seventy; her gray
hair was drawn back from the forehead, and gathered under a stiff cap
of quaker-like simplicity; while her dress, rich but plain, and of no very
modern fashion, served to increase the venerable appearance of one
who seemed not ashamed of years.
"My dear Mrs. Leslie," said the lady of the house, after a thoughtful
pause in the conversation that had been carried on for the last hour, "it
is very true; perhaps I was to blame in coming to this place; I ought not
to have been so selfish."
"No, my dear friend," returned Mrs. Leslie, gently; "selfish is a word
that can never be applied to you; you acted as became you,--agreeably
to your own instinctive sense of what is best when at your
age,--independent in fortune and rank, and still so lovely,--you resigned
all that would have attracted others, and devoted yourself, in retirement,
to a life of quiet and unknown benevolence. You are in your sphere in
this village,--humble though it be,--consoling, relieving, healing the
wretched, the destitute, the infirm; and teaching your Evelyn insensibly
to imitate your modest and Christian virtues." The good old lady spoke
warmly, and with tears in her eyes; her companion placed her hand in
Mrs. Leslie's.
"You cannot make me vain," said she, with a sweet and melancholy
smile. "I remember what I was when you first gave shelter to the poor,
desolate wanderer and her fatherless child; and I, who was then so poor
and destitute, what should I be, if I was deaf to the poverty and sorrows
of others,--others, too, who are better than I am. But now Evelyn, as
you say, is growing up; the time approaches when she must decide on
accepting or rejecting Lord Vargrave. And yet in this village how can

she compare him with others; how can she form a choice? What you
say is very true; and yet I did not think of it sufficiently. What shall I
do? I am only anxious, dear girl, to act so as may be best for her own
happiness."
"Of that I am sure," returned Mrs. Leslie; "and yet I know not how to
advise. On one hand, so much is due to the wishes of your late husband,
in every point of view, that if Lord Vargrave be worthy of Evelyn's
esteem and affection, it would