Patience ?--with a man who could never sympathize with her intellectually or artistically ?--the relations of married life with a husband who made assignations with an old love, under the eyes of the whole neighbourhood ?--the narrowing, cramping influences of English provincial society?
No! she was born for other and greater things, and she would grasp them.

"My first duty is to myself--to my own development.

We have absolutely no _right_ to sacrifice ourselves--as women have been taught to do for thousands of years." Bewildered by the rhetoric of her own thoughts, Daphne returned to her seat by the fire, and sat there wildly dreaming, till once more recalled to practical possibilities by the passage of the hours on the clock above her.
Miss Farmer?
Everything, it seemed, depended on her.

But Daphne had no doubts of her.

Poor girl!--with her poverty-stricken home, her drunken father lately dismissed from his post, and her evident inclination towards this clever young fellow now employed in the house--Daphne rejoiced to think of what money could do, in this case at least; of the reward that should be waiting for the girl's devotion when the moment came; of the gifts already made, and the gratitude already evoked.