Such a contingency as this had never been foreseen by that dispenser of proverbs.

It had lifted him out of himself.

Matthew's sturdy individualism might have taken the form of liberalism, or perhaps materialism, if it had appeared two centuries later; but in the period in which his years were cast, the art of keeping close to the ground had not been fully learned.

Matthew was filled with a sentiment which he neither knew nor attempted to define.

At least he was sure that the mare was not to be caught.