"You do?"
"Much better than that."
"And he is not one of the most touch-me-not pieces of English birth and wealth that ever stood upon their own dignity?"
"Not at all!" said Fleda;--"how people may be misunderstood!--he is one of the most gentle and kind persons I ever saw."
"To you!"
"To everybody that deserves it."
"Humph!--And not proud?"
"No, not as you understand it,"--and she felt it was very difficult to make him understand it, as the discovery involved a very offensive implication;--"he is too fine a character to be proud."
"That is arguing in a circle with a vengeance!" said Charlton.
"I know what you are thinking of," said Fleda, "and I suppose it passes for pride with a great many people who cannot comprehend it--he has a singular power of quietly rebuking wrong, and keeping impertinence at a distance--where Capt. Rossitur, for instance, I suppose, would throw his cap in a man's face, Mr. Carleton's mere silence would make the offender doff his and ask pardon."