“Yes; it is superficially soft and impressible, but the core of it is hard and rough—hard and rough! Oh, Rosalie, can’t you _try_ to like me a little?” “I like you very much without trying!” “Oh, you know what I mean, you tormenting girl! Can’t you—you—can’t you love me well enough to be my own? Speak! Answer! Tell me, Rose!” “Oh, Robert, how many times have I told you—no?” “I—but I won’t take no for an answer! All my affections and hopes are freighted in you, and I _will not_ resign you; I _will not_, Rose. I will go on hoping in spite of you—hoping against hope! It is _impossible_—mind I say _impossible_—any one loving as I do, should not win love in return. It does seem to me as if it would be unjust in heaven to permit it!” He spoke with impatient, passionate vehemence and earnestness. Rosalie watched and heard him with wondering and sorrowing interest. She gravely said— “‘It is impossible that one loving so much should not win love in return,’ you say? Yes, it _does_ seem impossible, if we did not know it to be often really possible. It _does_ seem unjust!” “You acknowledge it! You own it to be unjust that I should give you so much—give you _all_—my entire heart, with all its affections and hopes—and get back nothing, _nothing_ in return—or next to it—only ‘esteem,’ forsooth! and ‘friendship!’ That provokes and exasperates me beyond endurance! Rosalie, I don’t want your esteem or friendship. I refuse and repudiate it! I reject and repulse it! I will have none of it! Give me _nothing_, or give me your whole heart and hand!” “I would to Heaven I could do it, Robert! I would to Heaven I could give you my heart. I am ready to say that if I could, I should then be a happy and enviable girl, because I believe you a most excellent young man, whose only weakness is your regard for me. But I cannot, Robert. With all my friendship for you”— “_Don’t_ name it!” “I must, Robert! With all my friendship for you, when you talk of love, my heart grows hard and cold, and silent as a stone—it has no response for you at all.” “And you say that to drive me out of my senses—to make me wild!” “I say it because it is the simple truth. I am sorry that such _is_ the truth. I think, with you, it is strange—strange—almost unjust, that so much priceless love should be thrown away.” “How cool she is! Good Heaven, how cool she is!” “I have a problem for you, Robert; and I want to see if, with all your mathematics, you can solve it, and satisfy me as to why there is so much love lost in this world.” “She can philosophise, too, after her fashion. She can do anything but love!” “Will you solve my problem?” “It belongs rather to metaphysics than mathematics, one would think—nevertheless, state it.”