senting another sort of contrast. Imagine--we
all of us can--the pathetic stamp of consumption with its brilliancy of
glance to which the sharply-defined structure of features reminding one
of a forsaken temple, give already a far-off look as of one getting
unwillingly out of reach; and imagine it on a Jewish face naturally
accentuated for the expression of an eager mind--the face of a man
little above thirty, but with that age upon it which belongs to time
lengthened by suffering, the hair and beard, still black, throwing out
the yellow pallor of the skin, the difficult breathing giving more
decided marking to the mobile nostril, the wasted yellow hands
conspicuous on the folded arms: then give to the yearning consumptive
glance something of the slowly dying mother's look, when her one loved
son visits her bedside, and the flickering power of gladness leaps out
as she says, "My boy!"--for the sense of spiritual perpetuation in
another resembles that maternal transference of self.

Seeing such a portrait you would see Mordecai. And opposite to him was
a face not more distinctively oriental than many a type seen among what
we call the Latin races; rich in youthful health, and with a forcible
masculine gravity in its repose, that gave the value of judgment to the
reverence with which he met the gaze of this mysterious son of poverty
who claimed him as a long-expected friend. The more exquisite quality
of Deronda's nature--that keenly perceptive sympathetic emotiveness
which ran along with his speculative tendency--was never more
thoroughly tested. He felt nothing that could be called belief in the
validity of Mordecai's impressions concerning him or in the probability
of any greatly effective issue: what he felt was a profound sensibility
to a cry from the depths of another and accompanying that, the summons
to be receptive instead of superciliously prejudging. Receptiveness is
a rare and massive power, like fortitude; and this state of mind now
gave Deronda's face its utmost expression of calm benignant force--an
expression which nourished Mordecai's confidence and made an open way
before him. He began to speak.

"You cannot know what has guided me to you and brought us together at
this moment. You are wondering."

"I am not impatient," said Deronda. "I am ready to listen to whatever
you may wish to disclose."

"You see some of the reasons why I needed you," said Mordecai, speaking
quietly, as if he wished to reserve