As for Paul himself, the effect upon him was very great. Perhaps it was because of the profound dissatisfaction in his mind with all his own plans, that he had so long resisted the call to come home. Since his father had left Oxford, Paul had gone through many chapters of experience. Every day had made him more discontented with his future associates, more secretly appalled by the idea that the rest of his life was to be spent entirely among them. He had left his rooms in college, and gone into some very homely ones not far from Spears’s, by way of accustoming himself to his new life. This was a thing he had long intended to do, and he had been angry with himself for his weak-minded regard for personal comfort, but unfortunately his enthusiasm had begun to sink into disgust before he took this step, and his loathing for the little mean rooms, the narrow street full of crowding children and evil odours was intense. That he had forced himself to remain, notwithstanding this loathing, was perhaps all the worse for his plans. He would not yield to his own disgust, but it inspired him with a secret horror and opposition far more important than this mere dislike of his surroundings. He saw that none of the others minded those things, which made his existence miserable. Even Spears, whose perceptions in some respects were delicate, did not smell the smell, nor perceive the squalor. He thought Paul’s new lodgings very handsome; he called him Paul, without any longer even the apologetic smile which at first accompanied that familiarity, as a matter of course. And Janet gave him no peace. She called him out with little beckonings and signs. She was always in the way when he came or went. She took the charge of him, telling him what he ought to do and what not to do, with an attempt at that petty tyranny which a woman who is loved may exercise with impunity, but which becomes intolerable in any other.