omitted--that the Klesmers on the eve of departure have
behaved magnificently, shining forth as might be expected from the
planets of genius and fortune in conjunction. Mirah is rich with their
oriental gifts.

What luck it will be if you come back and present yourself at the
Abbey while I am there! I am going to behave with consummate
discretion and win golden opinions, But I shall run up to town now and
then, just for a peep into Gad Eden. You see how far I have got in
Hebrew lore--up with my Lord Bolingbroke, who knew no Hebrew, but
"understood that sort of learning and what is writ about it." If Mirah
commanded, I would go to a depth below the tri-literal roots. Already
it makes no difference to me whether the points are there or not. But
while her brother's life lasts I suspect she would not listen to a
lover, even one whose "hair is like a flock of goats on Mount
Gilead"--and I flatter myself that few heads would bear that trying
comparison better than mine. So I stay with my hope among the
orchard-blossoms.

Your devoted,

HANS MEYRICK.

Some months before, this letter from Hans would have divided Deronda's
thoughts irritatingly: its romancing, about Mirah would have had an
unpleasant edge, scarcely anointed with any commiseration for his
friend's probable disappointment. But things had altered since March.
Mirah was no longer so critically placed with regard to the Meyricks,
and Deronda's own position had been undergoing a change which had just
been crowned by the revelation of his birth. The new opening toward the
future, though he would not trust in any definite visions, inevitably
shed new lights, and influenced his mood toward past and present;
hence, what Hans called his hope now seemed to Deronda, not a
mischievous unreasonableness which roused his indignation, but an
unusually persistent bird-dance of an extravagant fancy, and he would
have felt quite able to pity any consequent suffering of his friend's,
if he had believed in the suffering as probable. But some of the busy
thought filling that long day, which passed without his receiving any
new summons from his mother, was given to the argument that Hans
Meyrick's nature was not one in which love could strike the deep roots
that turn disappointment into sorrow: it was too restless, too readily
excitable by novelty, too ready to turn itself into imaginative
material, and wear it