“ The noble buoyancy of her attitude, its suggestion of soaring grace, revealed the touch of poetry in her beauty that Selden always felt in her presence, yet lost the sense of when he was not with her.… Edith Wharton
“ How beautiful it was---and how she loved beauty! She had always felt that her sensibility in this direction made up for certain obtuseness of feeling of which she was less proud. Edith Wharton
“ But he could never be long without trying to find a reason for what she was doing . . . Edith Wharton
“ You asked me just now for the truth---well, the truth about any girl is that once she’s talk about she’s done for; and the more she explains her case the worse it looks. Edith Wharton
“ He had a confused sense that she must have cost a great deal to make, that a great many dull and ugly people must, in some mysterious way, have been sacrificed to produce her. Edith Wharton
