She dismissed the past – trod upon it and put it out, as one treads on a coal that is smouldering and dangerous. - Thomas Hardy

Why should we faint, and fear to live alone,
Since all alone, so Heaven has will’d, we die?

She showed that oblique-mannered softness which is perhaps more frequent in women of darker complexion and more lymphatic temperament than Mrs. Charmond’s was; women who lingeringly smile their meanings to men rather than speak to them, who inveigle rather than prompt, and take advantage of currents rather than steer.

The Fawleys were not made for wedlock: it never seemed to sit well upon us. There's sommat in our blood that won't take kindly to the notion of being bound to do what we do readily enough if not bound. ...