She had got herself into perfect training, but had won none of the prizes.

She was always plain Madame Merle, the widow of a Swiss negociant, with a small income and a large acquaintance, who stayed with people a great deal and was almost as universally "liked" as some new volume of smooth twaddle.

The contrast between this position and any one of some half-dozen others that he supposed to have at various moments engaged her hope had an element of the tragical.

His mother thought he got on beautifully with their genial guest; to Mrs.Touchett's sense two persons who dealt so largely in too-ingenious theories of conduct--that is of their own--would have much in common.

He had given due consideration to Isabel's intimacy with her eminent friend, having long since made up his mind that he could not, without opposition, keep his cousin to himself; and he made the best of it, as he had done of worse things.