Yet there was a difference.

Only so short a time ago, the incidents of her own daily life, even the possibilities connected with it, had seemed utterly insignificant, so little worthy of notice.

Morning and night her heart had been full of the sufferings of those amongst whom she worked.

The flagrant, hateful injustice of this ill-arranged world had throbbed in her pulses, absorbed her interests, had occupied the whole horizon of her life.

To marry Richard Graveling might sometime be advisable, in the interests of their joint labours.
And suddenly it had become impossible.