With the exception of the time spent in the dining-room, the young
people saw little of Sir Iltyd. That he liked Dartmouth and enjoyed
his society were facts he did not pretend to disguise. But the habits
of years were too strong, and he always wandered back to his books. He
did not trouble himself about proprieties. Weir had grown up and ruled
the castle all these years without a chaperon, and he had lived out
of the world too long to suggest the advisability of one now. His
daughter and her lover experienced no yearning for supervision, and
the free, untrammelled life was a very pleasant one, particularly to
Dartmouth, who always gave to novelty its just meed of appreciation.
At this period, in fact, Dartmouth's frame of mind left nothing to be
desired. In the first place, it was a delightful experience to find
himself able to stand the uninterrupted society of one woman from
morning till night, day after day, without a suggestion of fatigue.
And in the second, he found her a charming study. It is true that he
was very much in love, very sincerely and passionately in love; but
at the same time, his brain had been trained through too many years to
the habit of analysis; he could no more help studying Weir and drawing
her on to reveal herself than he could help loving her. She was not a
difficult problem to solve, individual as she was, because she was so
natural. Her experience with the world had been too brief to give her
an opportunity to encase herself in any shell which would not fall
from her at the first reaction to primitive conditions; and above all,
she was in love.

In the love of a woman there is always a certain element of
childishness, which has a reflex, if but temporary action upon her
whole nature. The phenomenon is due partly to the fact that she is
under the dominant influence of a wholly natural instinct, partly to