As Bell wished her sister good-night with perhaps more than her usual affection, it was evident that Lily’s words and eager tone had in some way pleased her, in spite of their opposition to the request which she had made.  And Lily was aware that it was so.

CHAPTER IV

Mrs Roper’s Boarding-House

I have said that John Eames had been petted by none but his mother, but I would not have it supposed, on this account, that John Eames had no friends.  There is a class of young men who never get petted, though they may not be the less esteemed, or perhaps loved.  They do not come forth to the world as Apollos, nor shine at all, keeping what light they may have for inward purposes.  Such young men are often awkward, ungainly, and not yet formed in their gait; they straggle with their limbs, and are shy; words do not come to them with ease, when words are required, among any but their accustomed associates.  Social meetings are periods of penance to them, and any appearance in public will unnerve them.  They go much about alone, and blush when women speak to them.  In truth, they are not as yet men, whatever the number may be of their years; and, as they are no longer boys, the world has found for them the ungraceful name of hobbledehoy.

Such observations, however, as I have been enabled to make in this matter have led me to believe that the hobbledehoy is by no means the least valuable species of the human race.  When I compare the hobbledehoy of one or two and twenty to some finished Apollo of the same age, I regard the former as unripe fruit, and the latter as fruit that is ripe.  Then comes the question as to the two fruits.  Which is the better fruit, that which ripens early,—­which is, perhaps, favoured with some little forcing apparatus, or which, at least, is backed by the warmth of a southern wall; or that fruit of slower growth, as to which nature works without assistance, on which the sun operates in its own time,—­or perhaps never operates if some ungenial shade has been allowed to interpose itself?  The world, no doubt, is in favour of the forcing apparatus or of the southern wall.  The fruit comes certainly, and at an assured period.  It is spotless, speckless, and of a certain quality by no means despicable.  The owner has it when he wants it, and it serves its turn.  But, nevertheless, according to my thinking, the fullest flavour of the sun is given to that other fruit,—­is given in the sun’s own good time, if so be that no ungenial shade has interposed itself.  I like the smack of the natural growth, and like it, perhaps, the better because that which has been obtained has been obtained without favour.

But the hobbledehoy, though he blushes when women address him, and is uneasy even when he is near them, though he is not master of his limbs in a ball-room, and is hardly master of his tongue at any time, is the most eloquent of beings, and especially eloquent among beautiful women.  He enjoys all the triumphs of a Don Juan, without any of Don Juan’s heartlessness, and is able to conquer in all encounters, through the force of his wit and the sweetness of his voice.  But this eloquence is heard only by his own inner ears, and these triumphs are the triumphs of his imagination.