"If that is Cousin Phyllis, she is beautiful. Don't you think so, Elizabeth?" "Yes; how perfectly she was dressed." "That is a woman's criticism. Did you see her soft, dark eyes, her small bow-shaped mouth--a beauty one rarely finds in English women--her exquisite complexion, her little feet?" "That is a man's criticism. How could you see all that in a moment or two of such confusion?" "Easily; how was she dressed?" "In a plain dress of gray cloth. The fit was perfect, the linen collar and cuffs spotless, the gray bonnet, with its drooping, gray feather bewitching. She wore gray gloves and a traveling cloak of the same color, which hung like a princess's mantle." "How could you see all that in a moment or two of such confusion?" "Do not be too clever, Antony. You forget I went with her to her rooms." "Did you notice Richard?" "A little; he resembles his sister. Their foreign look as they stood beside you and father was very remarkable. Neither of them are like Hallams." "I am so glad of it; a new element coming into life is like a fresh wind 'blowing through breathless woods.'" But Elizabeth sighed. This dissatisfaction with the old, and craving for the new, was one of the points upon which Antony and his father were unable to understand each other. Nothing permanent pleased Antony, and no one could ever predicate of him what course he would pursue, or what side he would take. As a general rule, however, he preferred the opposition in all things. Now, the squire's principles and opinions were as clear to his own mind as his own existence was. He believed firmly in his Bible, in the English Constitution, and in himself. He admitted no faults in the first two; his own shortcomings toward Heaven he willingly acknowledged; but he regarded his attitude toward his fellow-man as without fault. All his motives and actions proceeded from well-understood truths, and they moved in consistent and admirable grooves. Antony had fallen upon different times, and been brought under more uncertain influences. Oxford, "the most loyal," had been in a religious ferment during his stay there. The spirit of Pusey and Newman was shaking the Church of England like a great wind; and though Antony had been but little touched by the spiritual aspect of the movement, the temporal accusations of corruption and desertion of duty were good lances to tilt against the Church with. It gave him a curiously mixed pleasure to provoke the squire to do battle for her; partly from contradiction, partly that he might show off his array of second-hand learning and logic; and partly, also, for the delight of asserting his own opinions and his own individuality.