That dog by the roadside; how the anguish of its eyes had haunted her through the day I It was the revolt of her whole being against the cruelty inherent in life.

That evening she could not read the book she had in hand; its phrases seemed to fall into triviality.
Yet--she reasoned at a later time--it should not have been so; the haggard gaze of fate should not daunt one; pity is but an element in the soul's ideal of order, it should not usurp a barren sovereignty.

It is the miserable contradiction in our lot that the efficiency of the instincts of beauty-worship waits upon a force of individuality attainable only by a sacrifice of sensibility.

Emily divined this.

So it was that she came to shun the thought of struggle, to seek an abode apart from turbid conditions of life.