Isabel Archer was a young person of many theories; her imagination was remarkably active.

It had been her fortune to possess a finer mind than most of the persons among whom her lot was cast; to have a larger perception of surrounding facts and to care for knowledge that was tinged with the unfamiliar.

It is true that among her contemporaries she passed for a young woman of extraordinary profundity; for these excellent people never withheld their admiration from a reach of intellect of which they themselves were not conscious, and spoke of Isabel as a prodigy of learning, a creature reported to have read the classic authors--in translations.

Her paternal aunt, Mrs.Varian, once spread the rumour that Isabel was writing a book--Mrs.Varian having a reverence for books, and averred that the girl would distinguish herself in print.

Mrs.Varian thought highly of literature, for which she entertained that esteem that is connected with a sense of privation.
Her own large house, remarkable for its assortment of mosaic tables and decorated ceilings, was unfurnished with a library, and in the way of printed volumes contained nothing but half a dozen novels in paper on a shelf in the apartment of one of the Miss Varians.