Mathilda by Mary Shelly Chapter 4 Page 18

his finger on his lips, and with a deprecating look that I could not resist, turn away. If I wept he would gaze on me in silence but he was no longer harsh and although he repulsed every caress yet it was with gentleness.

He seemed to cherish a mild grief and softer emotions although sad as a relief from despair — He contrived in many ways to nurse his melancholy as an antidote to wilder passion. He perpetually frequented the walks that had been favourites with him when he and my mother wandered together talking of love and happiness; he collected every relic that remained of her and always sat opposite her picture which hung in the room fixing on it a look of sad despair — and all this was done in a mystic and awful silence. If his passion subdued him he locked himself in his room; and at night when he