There was something about the girl that made the thought of his mother a holier and tenderer thing.

He had loved his mother intensely, and since her death, had felt her loss as the saddest calamity that had, or possibly ever could, befall him.

Afloat on the stormy sea of human life, he had seemed like a mariner without helm or compass.

Strangely enough, since meeting with Jenny at the cottage a little while before, the thought of her appeared to bring his mother nearer to him; and when, so unexpectedly, he saw her approaching him in the woods, he felt momentarily, that it was his mother's spirit guiding her thither.
Urged by so strong an appeal, Jenny suffered herself to be led to the retired spot where Mark had been reclining, half wondering, half fearful--yet impelled by a certain feeling that she could not well resist.

In fact, each exercised a power over the other, a power not arising from any determination of will, but from a certain spiritual affinity that neither comprehended.