Rose, Blanche, and Violet, Volume I by George Henry Lewes

The next day Julius was meditatively fishing in the mill-pool adjoining the village school, and trying to decipher the character of Rose, who alternately fascinated and repulsed him by her vivacity.

I have said that he was utterly destitute of all personal beauty. This is so common an occurrence, that it would scarcely be worth mentioning in any other case: beauty being the quality which, of all others, men can best dispense with. A charm when possessed, its absence is not an evil. In Julius's case, however, it happened to be important, from the importance he attributed to it, and the excessive importance given to it by him thus originated.