First, she accepted his compliment as his sincere and fervent conviction.

Secondly, she never doubted that he expressed his continuous belief, not his feeling of the moment.

Thirdly, she regarded beauty in her case as thenceforward an established fact, and not this one man's opinion.

Fourthly, she spent some restless months in persuading herself that to admire must needs be to love, and she longed in vain to see him "come forward." Then some other casual acquaintance paid her a compliment, and she went through the same experience on his account, persuading herself that her first admirer could not afford to marry; and this state of things had now gone on for several years..