She always remembered that the girl was
the daughter of a great duke, and that her position in the house
had sprung from circumstances which would not, perhaps, in the
eyes of the world at large, have recommended her for such a
friendship. She knew,--the reader may possibly know--that nothing
had ever been purer, nothing more disinterested than her
friendship. But she knew also--no one knew better--that the
judgement of men and women does not always run parallel with
facts. She entertained, too, a conviction with regard to herself,
that hard words and hard judgements were to be expected from the
world,--and were to be accepted by her without any strong feeling
of injustice,--because she had been elevated by chance to the
possession of more good things than she merited. She weighed all
this with a very fine balance, and even after the encouragement
she had received from the Duke, was intent on confining herself to
some position about the girl inferior to that which such a friend
as Lady Cantrip might have occupied. But the girl's manner and the
girl's speech about her own mother, overcame her.
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