 the end of July, Deronda was rowing himself on the
Thames. It was already a year or more since he had come back to England, with
the understanding that his education was finished, and that he was somehow to
take his place in English society; but though, in deference to Sir Hugo's wish,
and to fence off idleness, he had begun to read law, this apparent decision had
been without other result than to deepen the roots of indecision. His old love
of boating had revived with the more force now that he was in town with the
Mallingers, because he could nowhere else get the same still seclusion which the
river gave him. He had a boat of his own at Putney, and whenever Sir Hugo did
not want him, it was his chief holiday to row till past sunset and come in again
with the stars. Not that he was in a sentimental stage; but he was in another
sort of contemplative mood perhaps more common in the young men of our day -
that of questioning whether it were worth while to take part in the battle of
the world: I mean, of course, the young men in whom the unproductive labour of
questioning is sustained by three or five per cent on capital which somebody
else has battled for. It puzzled Sir Hugo that one who made a splendid contrast
with all that was sickly and puling should be hampered with ideas which, since
they left an accomplished Whig like himself unobstructed, could be no better
than spectral illusions; especially as Deronda set himself against authorship -
a vocation which is understood to turn foolish thinking into funds.
    Rowing in his dark-blue shirt and skull-cap, his curls closely clipped, his
mouth beset with abundant soft waves of beard, he bore only disguised traces of
the seraphic boy »trailing clouds of glory.« Still, even one who had never seen
him since his boyhood might have looked at him with slow recognition, due
perhaps to the peculiarity of the gaze which Gwendolen chose to call »dreadful,«
though it had really a very mild sort of scrutiny. The voice, sometimes audible
in subdued snatches of song, had turned out merely a high barytone; indeed, only
to look at his lithe powerful frame and the firm gravity of his face would have
been enough for an experienced guess that he had no rare and ravishing tenor
such as nature reluctantly makes at some sacrifice. Look at his hands: they are
not small and dimpled, with tapering fingers that seem to have only a
deprecating touch: they are long, flexible, firmly-grasping hands, such as
Titian has
