He loved her still, no doubt; but the bright holiday-time of his love was over, and his wife's presence had no longer the power to charm away every dreary thought.

He was a man in whose disposition there was a lurking vein of melancholy--a kind of chronic discontent very common to men of whom it has been said that they might do great things in the world, and who have succeeded in doing nothing.
It is not to be supposed that Mr.Holbrook intended to keep his wife shut away from the world in a lonely farm-house all her life.

The place suited him very well for the present; the apartments at the Grange, and the services of Mr.Carley and his dependents, had been put at his disposal by the owner of the estate, together with all farm and garden produce.
Existence here therefore cost him very little; his chief expenses were in gifts to the bailiff and his underlings, which he bestowed with a liberal hand.

His plans for the future were as yet altogether vague and unsettled.

He had thoughts of emigration, of beginning life afresh in a new country--anything to escape from the perplexities that surrounded him here; and he had his reasons for keeping his wife secluded.