victims from the family. But still they were grand people, and never were
afraid of death.

And then Sir Florian fell in love. Discussing this matter with his
brother, who was perhaps his only intimate friend, he declared that if the
girl he loved would give herself to him, he would make what atonement he
could to her for his own early death by a princely settlement. John
Eustace, who was somewhat nearly concerned in the matter, raised no
objection to this proposal. There was ever something grand about these
Eustaces. Sir Florian was a grand gentleman; but surely he must have been
dull of intellect, slow of discernment, blear-eyed in his ways about the
town, when he took Lizzie Greystock--of all the women whom he could find
in the world--to be the purest, the truest, and the noblest. It has been
said of Sir Florian that he did not believe in virtue. He freely expressed
disbelief in the virtue of women around him--in the virtue of women of all
ranks. But he believed in his mother and sisters as though they were
heaven-born; and he was one who could believe in his wife as though she
were the queen of heaven. He did believe in Lizzie Greystock, thinking
that intellect, purity, truth, and beauty, each perfect in its degree,
were combined in her. The intellect and beauty were there; but for the
purity and truth, how could it have been that such a one as Sir Florian
Eustace should have been so blind!

Sir Florian was not indeed a clever man; but he believed himself to be a
fool, and believing himself to be a fool, he desired, nay, painfully
longed, for some of those results of cleverness which might, he thought,
come to him from contact with a clever woman. Lizzie read poetry well, and
she read verses to him, sitting very near to him, almost in the dark, with
a shaded lamp throwing its light on her book. He was astonished to find
how sweet a thing was poetry. By himself he could never read a line, but