The hand was too big.

It should be altered at the next sitting.

Then he sprang up, found pen and paper, and began to write to Phoebe--still in the same softened and agitated state.

He wrote in haste and at length, satisfying some hungry instinct in himself by the phrases of endearment which he scattered plentifully through the letter.
* * * * * That letter found Phoebe on a mid-March morning, when the thrushes were beginning to sing, when the larches were reddening, and only in the topmost hollows of the pikes did any snow remain, to catch the strengthening sunlight.
As she opened it, she looked at its length with astonishment.

Then the tone of it brought the rushing colour to her cheek, and when it was finished she kissed it and hid it in her dress.