One may see that all these self-inquiries tended Rubb-wards. I do not
mean that they were made with any direct intention on her part to
reconcile herself to a marriage with Mr Samuel Rubb, or that she even
thought of such an event as probable. He had said nothing to her to
justify such thought, and as yet she knew but very little of him.
But they all went to reconcile her to that sphere of life which her
brother Tom had chosen, and which her brother Walter had despised.
They taught her to believe that a firm footing below was better than
what might, after a life's struggle, be found to be but a false
footing above. And they were brightened undoubtedly by an idea that
some marriage in which she could love and be loved was possible to
her below, though it would hardly be possible to her above.

Her only disputant on the subject was Miss Baker, and she startled
that lady much by the things which she said. Now, with Miss Baker,
not to be a lady was to be nothing. It was her weakness, and I may
also say her strength. Her ladyhood was of that nature that it took
no soil from outer contact. It depended, even within her own bosom,
on her own conduct solely, and in no degree on the conduct of those
among whom she might chance to find herself. She thought it well
to pass her evenings with Mr Stumfold's people, and he at any rate
had the manners of a gentleman. So thinking, she felt in no wise
disgraced because the coachbuilder's wife was a vulgar, illiterate
woman. But there were things, not bad in themselves, which she
herself would never have done, because she was a lady. She would have
broken her heart rather than marry a man who was not a gentleman. It
was not unlady-like to eat cold mutton, and she ate it. But she would
have shuddered had she been called on to eat any mutton with a steel
fork. She had little generous ways with her, because they were the
ways of ladies, and she paid for them from off her own back and out
of her own dish. She would not go out to tea in a street cab, because
she was a lady and alone; but she had no objection to walk, with her
servant with her if it was dark. No wonder that such a woman was
dismayed by the philosophy of Miss Mackenzie.

And yet they had been brought together by much that was alike in
their dispositions. Miss Mackenzie had now been more than six months
an inhabitant of Littlebath, and six months at such places is enough
for close intimacies. They were both quiet, conscientiou