it was of Adela expressly that he thought. The poet's passion of
worship entered his heart; transferring his present feeling to his
earlier self, he grew to regard his recent madness as a lapse from
the true love of his life. He persuaded himself that he had loved
Adela in a far more serious way than any of the others who from time
to time had been her rivals, and that the love was now returning to
him, strengthened and exalted. He began to write sonnets in Dante's
manner, striving to body forth in words the new piety which
illumined his life. Whereas love had been to him of late a
glorification of the senses, he now cleansed himself from what he
deemed impurity and adored in mere ecstasy of the spirit. Adela soon
became rather a symbol than a living woman; he identified her with
the ends to which his life darkly aspired, and all but convinced
himself that memory and imagination would henceforth suffice to him.

In the autumn he went down to Agworth, and spent a few days with his
mother. The temptation to walk over to Wanley and call upon the
Walthams proved too strong to be resisted. His rejection at their
door was rather a shock than a surprise; it had never occurred to
him that the old friendly relations had been in any way disturbed;
he explained Mrs. Waltham's behaviour by supposing that his silence
had offended her, and perhaps his failure to take leave of her
before quitting Wanley. Possibly she thought he had dealt lightly
with Adela. Offence on purely moral grounds did not even suggest
itself.

He returned to London anxious and unhappy. The glimpse of Adela
sitting at the window had brought him back to reality; after all it
was no abstraction that had become the constant companion of his
solitude; his love was far more real for that moment's vision of the