Even in his wretchedness, Wilfrid could not but follow her with his eyes, and _feel_ something like a blessing upon her strong and tender womanhood.
Fortunate fellow, who had laid behind him thus much of his earthly journey without one day of grave suffering.

Ah, something he should have sacrificed to the envious gods, some lesser joy, that the essential happiness of his life might be spared him.

Wilfrid had yet to learn that every sun which rises for us in untroubled sky is a portent of inevitable gloom, that nature only prolongs our holiday to make the journey-work of misery the harder to bear.

He had enjoyed the way of his will from childhood upwards; he had come to regard himself as exempt from ill-fortune, even as he was exempt from the degradation of material need; all his doings had prospered, save in that little matter of his overtaxed health, and it had grown his habit to map the future with a generous hand, saying: Thus and thus will I take my conquering course.
Knowing love for the first time, he had met with love in return, love to the height of his desire, and with a wave of the hand he had swept the trivial obstacles from his path.

Now that the very sum of his exultant youth offered itself like a wine-cup to his lips, comes forth the mysterious hand and spills relentlessly that divine draught.