According to him, not the cub's mother only, but Hester also possessed
the qualities that went to the composition of this strange virtue in
eminent degrees. Cornelius continued his opposition, but modified it,
for he could not help feeling flattered, and began to think a little
more of his mother and of Hester too.
"She's a very good girl--of her sort--is Hester," he said; "I don't
require to be taught that, Mr. Vavasor. But she's too awfully serious.
She's in such earnest about everything--you haven't an idea! One
half-hour of her in one of her moods is enough to destroy a poor
beggar's peace of mind for ever. And there's no saying when the fit may
take her."
Vavasor laughed. But he said to himself "there was stuff in her: what
a woman might be made of her!" To him she seemed fit--with a little
developing aid--to grace the best society in the world. It was not
polish she needed but experience and insight, thought Vavasor, who would
have her learn to look on the world and its affairs as they saw them who
by long practice had disqualified themselves for seeing them in any
other than the artificial light of fashion.
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