But 'twas the women who said these things; the men swore that no man could tire of or desert such spirit and beauty, and that if Sir John Oxon stayed away 'twas because he had been commanded to do so, it never having been Mistress Clorinda's intention to do more than play with him awhile, she having been witty against him always for a fop, and meaning herself to accept no man as a husband who could not give her both rank and wealth.
"We know her," said the old boon companions of her childhood, as they talked of her over their bottles.

"She knew her price and would bargain for it when she was not eight years old, and would give us songs and kisses but when she was paid for them with sweet things and knickknacks from the toy-shops.

She will marry no man who cannot make her at least a countess, and she would take him but because there was not a duke at hand.

We know her, and her beauty's ways." But they did not know her; none knew her, save herself.
In the west wing, which grew more bare and ill-furnished as things wore out and time went by, Mistress Anne waxed thinner and paler.

She was so thin in two months' time, that her soft, dull eyes looked twice their natural size, and seemed to stare piteously at people.