Page:The Portrait of a Lady (1882).djvu/49

VI THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY. 41 VI. 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 young lady reputed 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 Isabel would distinguish herself in print. Mrs. Varian thought highly of literature, for which she entertained that esteem that is con- nected with a sense of privation. Her own large house, remark- able 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 aparfcrneut of one of the Miss Varians. Practically, Mrs. Varian's acquaintance with literature was confined to the New York Interviewer ; as she very justly said, after you had read &.Q Interviewer, you had no time for anything else. Her tendency, however, was rather to keep the Intefoieicer out of the way of her daughters ; she was determined to bring them up seriously, and they read nothing at all. Her impression with regard to Isabel's labours was quite illusory ; the girl never attempted to Write a book, and had no desire to be an authoress. She had no talent for expression, and had none of the consciousness of genius ; she only had a general idea, that people were right when they treated her as if she were rather superior. Whether or no she were superior, people were right in admiring her if they thought her so ; for it seemed to her often that her mind moved more quickly than theirs, and this encouraged an impatience that might easily be confounded with superiority. It may be affirmed without delay that Isabel was probably very liable to the sin of self-esteem ; she often surveyed with complacency the field of her own nature ; she was in the habit of taking for granted, on scanty evidence, that she was right; impulsively, she often admired herself. Meanwhile her errors and delusions were fre- quently such as a biographer .interested in preserving the dignity