To be fair to her, there was nothing in the latter which she had any great reason to be ashamed of, and many things of which she might have been proud; but it had never been fathomed by the honest minds of Hintock, and she rarely volunteered her experiences.

As for her capricious nature, the people on her estates grew accustomed to it, and with that marvellous subtlety of contrivance in steering round odd tempers, that is found in sons of the soil and dependants generally, they managed to get along under her government rather better than they would have done beneath a more equable rule.
Now, with regard to the doctor's notion of leaving Hintock, he had advanced further towards completing the purchase of the Budmouth surgeon's good-will than he had admitted to Mrs.Charmond.

The whole matter hung upon what he might do in the ensuing twenty-four hours.
The evening after leaving her he went out into the lane, and walked and pondered between the high hedges, now greenish-white with wild clematis--here called "old-man's beard," from its aspect later in the year.
The letter of acceptance was to be written that night, after which his departure from Hintock would be irrevocable.

But could he go away, remembering what had just passed?
The trees, the hills, the leaves, the grass--each had been endowed and quickened with a subtle charm since he had discovered the person and history, and, above all, mood of their owner.

There was every temporal reason for leaving; it would be entering again into a world which he had only quitted in a passion for isolation, induced by a fit of Achillean moodiness after an imagined slight.