Moreover, Lot, uprising from the great nest which he had hollowed out for himself from a sweet fern growth under the balsam firs, exhaling their fragrant breath of healing, and coming into sight, made better show than he had ever done in his own book-walled study.
Here, where the minds of other men swerved him and incited him not, where only Nature herself held him in leading-strings with unsearchable might or was laid bare before his daring eyes and many a secret discovered, Lot Gordon gained his best grace of home.

The balsam firs framed him with more truth than the door of his own dwelling.

To Madelon, as he came out from them, he looked more a man than he had ever done; for all unconsciously to her mind of strong and simple bent, he had seemed at times scarce a man but rather some strange character from a book, which had gotten life through too strong imagining.
Moreover to-day his likeness to Burr came out strongly.

Madelon saw the cant of his head and swing of his shoulders, with a half sense of shame that he was not Burr, and yet with a sudden understanding of him that she had never felt before.

She had not seen him since her betrothal to Burr.