For though she now and then would catch a glimpse of the outer man, which would remind her of that other beautiful one whom she had known in her youth, and though, as these glimpses came, she would remember how poor in spirit and how unmanly that other one had been, though she would confess to herself how terrible had been the heart-shipwreck which that other one had brought upon herself; still she was able completely to assure herself that this man, though not superior in external grace, was altogether different in mind and character.  She was old enough now to see all this and to appreciate it.  Young Tregear had his own ideas about the politics of the day, and they were ideas with which she sympathised, though they were antagonistic to the politics of her life.  He had his ideas about books too, as to manners of life, as to art, and even ethics.  Whether or no in all this there was not much that was superficial only, she was not herself deep enough to discover.  Nor would she have been deterred from admiring him had she been told that it was tinsel.  Such were the acquirements, such the charms, that she loved.  Here was a young man who dared to speak, and had always something ready to be spoken, who was not afraid of beauty, nor daunted by superiority of rank; who, if he had not money, could carry himself on equal terms among those who had.  In this way he won the Duchess’s heart, and having done that, was it odd that he should win the heart of her daughter also?

His father was a Cornwall squire of comfortable means, having joined the property of his wife to his own for the period of his own life.  She had possessed land also in Cornwall, supposed to be worth fifteen hundred a year, and his own paternal estate at Polwenning was said to be double the value.  Being a prudent man, he lived at home as a country gentleman, and thus was able in his county to hold his head as high as richer men.  But Frank Tregear was only his second son; and though Frank would hereafter inherit his mother’s fortune, he was by no means now in a position to assume the right of living as an idle man.  Yet he was idle.  The elder brother, who was considerably older than Frank, was an odd man, much addicted to quarreling with his family, and who spent his time chiefly in traveling about the world.  Frank’s mother, who was not the mother of the heir also, would sometimes surmise in Frank’s hearing, that the entire property must ultimately come to him.  That other Tregear, who was now supposed to be investigating the mountains of Crim Tartary, would surely never marry.  And Frank was the favourite also with his father, who paid his debts at Oxford with not much grumbling, who was proud of his friendship with a future duke, who did not urge, as he ought to have urged, that vital question of a profession; and who, when he allowed his son four hundred pounds a year, was almost content with that son’s protestations that he knew how to live as a poor man among rich men, without chagrin and without trouble.