THE AUSTINS 71 



fail ; the blindness of love would then be fatal as 

 it is proverbial. No, love works differently, and in 

 its blindness lies its strength. Man and woman, 

 each strongly desires to be loved, each opens to the 

 other that heart of ideal aspirations which they have 

 often hid till then ; each, thus knowing the ideal 

 of the other, tries to fulfil that ideal, each partially 

 succeeds. The greater the love, the greater the 

 success ; the nobler the idea of each, the more 

 durable, the more beautiful the effect. Meanwhile 

 the blindness of each to the other's defects enables 

 the transformation to proceed [unobserved], so 

 that when the veil is withdrawn (if it ever is, and 

 this I do not know) neither knows that any change 

 has occurred in the person whom they loved. Do 

 not fear, therefore. I do not tell you that your 

 friend will not change, but as I am sure that her 

 choice cannot be that of a man with a base ideal, 

 so I am sure the change will be a safe and a good one. 

 Do not fear that anything you love will vanish, 

 he must love it too.' 



Among other introductions in London, Fleeming The 

 had presented a letter from Mrs. Gaskell to the 

 Alfred Austins. This was a family certain to 

 interest a thoughtful young man. Alfred, the 

 youngest and least known of the Austins, had been 

 a beautiful golden-haired child, petted and kept out 

 of the way of both sport and study by a partial 

 mother. Bred an attorney, he had (like both his 



