Now that he belonged, as we may say, to
this noble family, he could hardly discern what were the advantages
which he had expected from this alliance. He had said to himself that
it would be much to have a countess for a mother-in-law; but now,
even already, although the possession to which he had looked was not
yet garnered, he was beginning to tell himself that the thing was not
worth possessing.
As he sat in the train, with a newspaper in his hand, he went on
acknowledging to himself that he was a villain. Lady Julia had spoken
the truth to him on the stairs at Courcy, and so he confessed over
and over again. But he was chiefly angry with himself for this,--that
he had been a villain without gaining anything by his villainy; that
he had been a villain, and was to lose so much by his villainy. He
made comparison between Lily and Alexandrina, and owned to himself,
over and over again, that Lily would make the best wife that a man
could take to his bosom. As to Alexandrina, he knew the thinness of
her character. She would stick by him, no doubt; and in a circuitous,
discontented, unhappy way, would probably be true to her duties as
a wife and mother.
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