Daniel Deronda by George Eliot — Read

He brings white asses laden with the freight / Of Tyrian vessels, purple, gold and balm, / To bribe my will: I'll bid them chase him forth, / Nor let him breathe the taint of his surmise / On my secure resolve. / Ay, 'tis secure: / And therefore let him come to spread his freight. / For firmness hath its appetite and craves / The stronger lure, more strongly to resist; / Would know the touch of gold to fling it off; / Scent wine to feel its lip the soberer; / Behold soft byssus, ivory, and plumes / To say, "They're fair, but I will none of them," / And flout Enticement in the very face.

Mr. Gascoigne one day came to Offendene with what he felt to be the satisfactory news that Mrs. Mompert had fixed Tuesday in the following week for her interview with Gwendolen at Wanchester. He said nothing of his having incidentally heard that Mr. Grandcourt had returned to Diplow; knowing no more than she did that Leubronn had been the goal of her admirer's journeying, and feeling that it would be unkind uselessly to revive the memory of a brilliant prospect under the present reverses. In his secret soul he thought of his niece's unintelligible caprice with regret, but he vindicated her to himself by considering that Grandcourt had been the first to behave oddly, in suddenly walking away when there had the best opportunity for crowning his marked attentions. The rector's practical judgment told him that his chief duty to his niece now was to encourage her resolutely to face the change in her lot, since there was no manifest promise of any event that would avert it.