"Who said it ?" I was disconcerted, for I had broken away without quite seeing where I was going to.

It was not to be shuffled off now, however, and I answered, "The beautiful young lady at Miss Havisham's, and she's more beautiful than anybody ever was, and I admire her dreadfully, and I want to be a gentleman on her account." Having made this lunatic confession, I began to throw my torn-up grass into the river, as if I had some thoughts of following it.
"Do you want to be a gentleman, to spite her or to gain her over ?" Biddy quietly asked me, after a pause.
"I don't know," I moodily answered.
"Because, if it is to spite her," Biddy pursued, "I should think--but you know best--that might be better and more independently done by caring nothing for her words.

And if it is to gain her over, I should think--but you know best--she was not worth gaining over." Exactly what I myself had thought, many times.

Exactly what was perfectly manifest to me at the moment.

But how could I, a poor dazed village lad, avoid that wonderful inconsistency into which the best and wisest of men fall every day?
"It may be all quite true," said I to Biddy, "but I admire her dreadfully." In short, I turned over on my face when I came to that, and got a good grasp on the hair on each side of my head, and wrenched it well.