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and in a manner wholly incoherent, she then went on: "Ellis, I pretend not to any mystery. Why is one person adorable, and another detestable, but to call forth our love and our hatred? to give birth to all that snatches us from mere inert existence; to our passions, our energies, our noblest conceptions of all that is towering and sublime? Whether you have any idea of this mental enlargement I cannot tell; but with it I see human nature endowed with capabilities immeasurable of perfection; and without it, I regard and treat the whole of my race as the mere dramatis personæ of a farce; of which I am myself, when performing with such fellow-actors, a principal buffoon."
Nearly out of breath, she stopt a moment; then, looking earnestly at Ellis, said, "Do you understand me?"
Ellis, in a fearful accent, answered, "I . . . I am not quite sure."
"Remove your doubts, then!" cried she, impatiently; "I despise what is
