“Oh! I ought to be _exceedingly_ obliged to you!” “Yes—I think so, too—but what malicious Puck gave _you_ a love-weed, and fooled you into sitting and studying that ugly little girl’s hard face all the evening?” “I did not think her ugly at all. She has a noble countenance. A _most_ noble countenance. One, of which an empress might be proud of!” “Ha, ha! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! _I_ saw nothing but a mountainous forehead, and a strong portcullis jaw! ‘Noble!’ Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! I said you’d taken the love-powder!” “Yet even you cannot find any but a _noble_ simile in speaking of her ‘ugly’ features!” “Ah! what will Miss Clifton think of this admiration?” “Sir, Miss Clifton has my deepest homage, and when she is my wife, she will indulge no follies. But, Fairfax, you are absurd, and I beg you will abandon this ridiculous conversation. You know that I have always had a proclivity to the study of character. Nature made me something of a physiognomist. And if there be any truth in my favorite science, that mountain-girl’s face presented the most extraordinary combination of power and goodness I have ever met with.” “Oh! then you only studied the maiden as the botanist would study a new plant, the geologist a new fossil, or the naturalist a strange animal?—” —“Or the astronomer a new STAR? Precisely, sir! Except that the human being is the highest and most absorbing study of all!” “Really! really! this passes belief—the proud, fastidious Archer Clifton, to be smitten with an ugly mountain-girl!” “Frank! Nonsense—you really anger me. Listen, then, and I will tell you why that child—for she is but a child—interested me so much. I saw in her face the signs of wonderful force of character, as yet undeveloped, and I saw in all her actions that which corroborated their testimony. I was surprised to find all that in the humble mountaineer, and speculated as to what, in her _very_ humble situation, it might lead. That was simply all!” “And did you not wish to be a providence to the mountain girl, and open a field for so much energy?” “Perhaps such a thought might have presented itself to my mind. If so, it was dismissed at once. A highly gifted _man_ of low birth must have extraordinary talents indeed, and be placed in extraordinary circumstances, to elevate himself above his condition—for a _girl_ in such a case it is impossible. But, Fairfax, really this conversation has taken a more serious tone than I designed it should. Really, nobility of character, though very rare among the lower classes of society, is yet not so impossible as to excite our wonder. There are others like Kate Kavanagh—” —“How pat you’ve got her name! Now _I_ had forgotten it!”