He stayed with her till quite late at night.

As he rode home he felt that he was finally initiated.

He was a youth no longer.

But why had he the dull pain in his soul?
Why did the thought of death, the after-life, seem so sweet and consoling?
He spent the week with Miriam, and wore her out with his passion before it was gone.

He had always, almost wilfully, to put her out of count, and act from the brute strength of his own feelings.