And that very wish gave her a peace she had never felt before.

She had formed her idea; she had now a purpose for which to live, and she determined to concentrate herself for the work, and longed for the moment when she should meet Lancelot, and begin--how, she did not very clearly see.
It is an old jest--the fair devotee trying to convert the young rake.

Men of the world laugh heartily at it; and so does the devil, no doubt.

If any readers wish to be fellow-jesters with that personage, they may; but, as sure as old Saxon women-worship remains for ever a blessed and healing law of life, the devotee may yet convert the rake--and, perhaps, herself into the bargain.
Argemone looked almost angrily round at her beloved books and drawings; for they spoke a message to her which they had never spoken before, of self-centred ambition.

'Yes,' she said aloud to herself, 'I have been selfish, utterly! Art, poetry, science--I believe, after all, that I have only loved them for my own sake, not for theirs, because they would make me something, feed my conceit of my own talents.