At first blush it almost seemed as if there were a little affectation in this careful mention of her new position, and the display of duty, on Phœbe’s part; but it was not so. Phœbe had argued out her duty, had reasoned with herself upon the course which she ought to pursue; she had prayed earnestly, and religiously striven to see aright, and the end was that she determined to act her part as became a dutiful child. It was not for her to judge her mother’s conduct, nor to repine at her change of fortune. If she had lost wealth and station, she had found a mother and father, and she had obtained thereby perfect freedom in the expression of her love for Arthur Phillips. On the whole, then, Phœbe’s real happiness had rather been enhanced by the discovery that she was not the wealthy Christopher Tallant’s daughter. A certain feeling of regret would make itself manifest to her now and then when she remembered the luxuries of the Hall, the charming books, the pictures, the familiar boudoir, with its dainty furniture; but this feeling was soon followed by a remembrance of the vague sense of loneliness which often afflicted her there, and the consciousness of being neglected by her father. Though there had been scarcely a wish that she could not gratify, so far as money was concerned, her life had not been altogether a happy one; it was calm and peaceful, but there had seemed to be no motive in it. Now all this was changed. Duty had stepped in between herself and the world. “Honour thy father and thy mother” was a commandment which had a new meaning for her. A certain amount of self-sacrifice seemed to be involved, and she made it cheerfully. And all the time she loved the landscape painter. Phœbe’s was not the love which Amy had felt for Lionel Hammerton; it was not that mad, passionate, doubting, hopeless, longing love, which often animates the heart that is fixed upon one of high rank and station; it was not the love of the lowly maiden for the prince, whom she feels that she lowers by her very passion; it was not the almost fanatical looking upwards of idol-worship; but the love which feels itself worthy of the thing it loves--the love of equals, the passion which has no worldly fears of rank intervening, the love that dreams not for a moment of condescension on either hand, the love that levels by its intense nobleness and generosity the king with his subject, the noble-born with the peasant, the rich with the poor.