Nature kindly sends such relief to children, and he was used to thinking Esther scarcely more than a child.

He put his arms upon the back of the chair, and thought.
"I will not wake her.

I have nothing to tell her--nothing unless--unless it be my love....

She is a daughter of Judah, and beautiful, and so unlike the Egyptian; for there it is all vanity, here all truth; there ambition, here duty; there selfishness, here self-sacrifice....

Nay, the question is not do I love her, but does she love me?
She was my friend from the beginning.