He was immensely pleased with his young
lady; Madame Merle had made him a present of incalculable value.
What could be a finer thing to live with than a high spirit attuned to
softness? For would not the softness be all for one's self, and the
strenuousness for society, which admired the air of superiority?
What could be a happier gift in a companion than a quick, fanciful
mind which saved one repetitions and reflected one's thought on a
polished, elegant surface? Osmond hated to see his thought
reproduced literally-that made it look stale and stupid; he
preferred it to be freshened in the reproduction even as "words" by
music. His egotism had never taken the crude form of desiring a dull
wife; this lady's intelligence was to be a silver plate, not an
earthen one-a plate that he might heap up with ripe fruits, to which
it would give a decorative value, so that talk might become for him
a sort of served dessert. He found the silver quality in this
perfection in Isabel; he could tap her imagination with his knuckle
and make it ring. He knew perfectly, though he had not been told, that
their union enjoyed little favour with the girl's relations; but he
had always treated her so completely as an independent person that
it hardly seemed necessary to express regret for the attitude of her
family.
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