was a shape his thanks took, whether Mary was to him an incorporate
gratitude, or whether he meant to imply that she was the fitter on
whom to shower favour, it were hard to say. His mother observed, and
in her mind put the two things together, that he did not seem to prize
much any mere possession. He looked pleased with a new suit of
clothes, but if any one remarked on his care of them, he would answer,
"I mustn't spoil what's papa and mamma's!" He made no hoard of any
kind. He did once hoard marbles till he had about a hundred; then it
was discovered that they were for a certain boy in the village who was
counted half-witted--as indeed was Clare himself by many. When he
learned that the boy had first been accused of stealing them--for no
one would believe that another boy had given them to him--and after
that robbed of them by the other boys, on the ground that he did not
know how to play with them, Clare saw that it was as foolish to hoard
for another as for himself.

He was a favourite with few beyond those that knew him well. Many who
saw him only at church, or about the village, did not take to him. His
still regard repelled them. In Naples they would have said he had the
evil eye. I think people had a vague sense of rebuke in his
presence. Even his mother, passionately loving her foundling, was
aware of a film between them through which she could not quite see
him, beyond which there was something she could not get at, Clare knew
nothing of such a separation. He seemed to himself altogether close to
his mother, was aware of nothing between to part them. The cause of
the thing was, that Clare was not yet in flower. His soul was a white
half-blown bud, not knowing that it was but half-blown. It basked in
the glory of the warm sun, but only with the underside of its
flower-leaves; it had not opened its heart, the sun-side of its
petals, to the love in which it was immerged. He received the love as