 that impression she had at first made upon him. Sidwell exhibited
all the qualities which most appealed to him in her class; in addition, she had
the charms of a personality which he could not think of common occurrence. He
was yet far from understanding her; she exercised his powers of observation,
analysis, conjecture, as no other person had ever done; each time he saw her
(were it but for a moment) he came away with some new perception of her
excellence, some hitherto unmarked grace of person or mind whereon to meditate.
He had never approached a woman who possessed this power at once of fascinating
his senses and controlling his intellect to a glad reverence. Whether in her
presence or musing upon her in solitude, he found that the unsparing naturalism
of his scrutiny was powerless to degrade that sweet, pure being.
    Rare, under any circumstances, is the passionate love which controls every
motive of heart and mind; rarer still that form of it which, with no assurance
of reciprocation, devotes exclusive ardour to an object only approachable
through declared obstacles. Godwin Peak was not framed for romantic
languishment. In general, the more complex a man's mechanism, and the more
pronounced his habit of introspection, the less capable is he of loving with
vehemence and constancy. Heroes of passion are for the most part primitive
natures, nobly tempered; in our time they tend to extinction. Growing vulgarism
on the one hand, and on the other a development of the psychological conscience,
are unfavourable to any relation between the sexes, save those which originate
in pure animalism, or in reasoning less or more generous. Never having
experienced any feeling which he could dignify with the name of love, Godwin had
no criterion in himself whereby to test the emotions now besetting him. In a man
of his age this was an unusual state of things, for when the ardour which will
bear analysis has at length declared itself, it is wont to be moderated by the
regretful memory of that fugacious essence which gave to the first frenzy of
youth its irrecoverable delight. He could not say in reply to his impulses: If
that was love which overmastered me, this must be something either more or less
exalted. What he did say was something of this kind: If desire and tenderness,
if frequency of dreaming rapture, if the calmest approval of the mind and the
heart's most exquisite, most painful throbbing, constitute love, - then
assuredly I love Sidwell. But if to love is to be possessed with madness, to
lose all taste of life when hope refuses itself, to meditate frantic
