She suffered from the conviction that trials foreseen were proving too strong for her.

Whenever her youth yielded to the allurement of natural joys, there followed misery of penitence.

Not that Miriam did in truth deem it a sin to enjoy the sunshine and the breath of the sea and the beauty of mountains (though such delights might become excessive, like any other, and so veil temptation), but she felt that for one in her position of peril there could not be too strict a watch kept upon the pleasures that were admitted.

Hence she could never forget herself in pleasure; her attitude must always be that of one on guard.
The name of Italy signified perilous enticement, and she was beginning to feel it.

The people amid whom she lived were all but avowed scorners of her belief, and yet she was beginning to like their society.