"
Though wholly inexpert in the ways of the world, Gabrielle was
conscious that the daughter of a doctor, the humble inhabitant of
Forcalier, was cast at too great a distance from Monseigneur Etienne,
Duc de Nivron and heir to the house of Herouville, to allow them to be
equal; she had as yet no conception of the ennobling of love. The
naive creature thought with no ambition of a place where every other
girl would have longed to seat herself; she saw the obstacles only.
Loving, without as yet knowing what it was to love, she only felt
herself distant from her pleasure, and longed to get nearer to it, as
a child longs for the golden grapes hanging high above its head. To a
girl whose emotions were stirred at the sight of a flower, and who had
unconsciously foreseen love in the chants of the liturgy, how sweet
and how strong must have been the feelings inspired in her breast the
previous night by the sight of the young seigneur's feebleness, which
seemed to reassure her own. But during the night Etienne had been
magnified to her mind; she had made him a hope, a power; she had
placed him so high that now she despaired of ever reaching him.
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