e what I could. And _your_ soul consents. That is
enough. I have after all been the instrument my father wanted.--'I
desire a grandson who shall have a true Jewish heart. Every Jew should
rear his family as if he hoped that a Deliverer might spring from it.'"

In uttering these last sentences the Princess narrowed her eyes, waved
her head up and down, and spoke slowly with a new kind of chest-voice,
as if she were quoting unwillingly.

"Were those my grandfather's words?" said Deronda.

"Yes, yes; and you will find them written. I wanted to thwart him,"
said the Princess, with a sudden outburst of the passion she had shown
in the former interview. Then she added more slowly, "You would have me
love what I have hated from the time I was so high"--here she held her
left hand a yard from the floor.--"That can never be. But what does it
matter? His yoke has been on me, whether I loved it or not. You are the
grandson he wanted. You speak as men do--as if you felt yourself wise.
What does it all mean?"

Her tone was abrupt and scornful. Deronda, in his pained feeling, and
under the solemn urgency of the moment, had to keep a clutching
remembrance of their relationship, lest his words should become cruel.
He began in a deep entreating tone:

"Mother, don't say that I feel myself wise. We are set in the midst of
difficulties. I see no other way to get any clearness than by being
truthful--not by keeping back facts which may--which should carry
obligation within them--which should make the only guidance toward
duty. No wonder if such facts come to reveal themselves in spite of
concealments. The effects prepared by generations are likely to triumph
over a contrivance which would bend them all to the satisfaction of
self. Your will was strong, but my grandfather's trust which you
accepted and did not fulfill--what you call his yoke--is the expression
of something stronger, with deeper, farther-spreading roots, knit into
the foundations of sacredness for all men. You renounced me--you still
banish me--as a son"--there was an involuntary movement of indignation
in Deronda's voice--"But that stronger Something has determined that I
shall be all the more the grandson whom also you willed to annihilate."

His mother was watching him fixedly, and again her face gathered
admiration. After a moment's silence she said, in a low, persuasive
tone--

"Sit down again," and he obeyed, placing himself beside her. She laid
her hand on his