Kendal,
and made an attempt, which was heroic considering the
delicacy of Miss Halifax's scruples, to measure his
appreciation of Miss Bell as a writer--to Miss Halifax
the word wore a halo--and as an individual. If she did
not succeed it was partly because he had not himself
quite decided whether Elfrida, in London, was delightful
or intolerable, and partly because he had no desire to
be complicated in social relations which, he told himself,
must be either ludicrous or insincere. The Halifaxes were
not in any sense literary; their proper pretensions to
that sort of society were buried with Sir William, who
had been editor of the _Brown Quarterly_ in his day, and
many other things. They had inherited his friends as they
had inherited his manuscripts; and in spite of a grievous
inability to edit either of them, they held to one legacy
as fast as to the other. Kendal thought with a somewhat
repelled amusement of any attempt of theirs to assimilate
Elfrida. It was different with the Cardiffs; but even
under their enthusiastic encouragement he was disinclined
to be anything but discreet and cautions about Elfrida.
In one way and another she was, at all events, a young
lady of potentialities, he reflected, and with a view to
their effect among one's friends it might be as well to
understand them.
Pages:
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174