He had dug the book out of a bookseller's shop in Malta, captivated by its title, and had, since the day of his purchase, gone at it again and again, getting nibbles of golden meaning by instalments, as with a solitary pick in a very dark mine, until the illumination of an idea struck him that there was a great deal more in the book than there was in himself.

This was sufficient to secure the devoted attachment of young Mr.Beauchamp.Rosamund sighed with apprehension to think of his unlikeness to boys and men among his countrymen in some things.

Why should he hug a book he owned he could not quite comprehend?
He said he liked a bone in his mouth; and it was natural wisdom, though unappreciated by women.

A bone in a boy's mind for him to gnaw and worry, corrects the vagrancies and promotes the healthy activities, whether there be marrow in it or not.

Supposing it furnishes only dramatic entertainment in that usually vacant tenement, or powder-shell, it will be of service.
Nevil proposed to her that her next present should be the entire list of his beloved Incomprehensible's published works, and she promised, and was not sorry to keep her promise dangling at the skirts of memory, to drop away in time.