In the matter of his second marriage he was seen at his
best, generously defiant of social cruelties; but self-knowledge was
denied him, and circumstances condemned his life to futility. Clara
inherited his temperament; transferred to her more complex nature,
it gained in subtlety and in power of self-direction, but lost in
its nobler elements. Her mother was a capable and ambitious woman,
one in whom active characteristics were more prominent than the
emotional. With such parents, every probability told against her
patient acceptance of a lot which allowed her faculties no scope.
And the circumstances of her childhood were such as added a peculiar
bitterness to the trials waiting upon her maturity.
Clara, you remember, had reached her eleventh year when her father's
brother died and left the legacy of which came so little profit.
That was in 1878. State education had recently made a show of
establishing itself, and in the Hewetts' world much argument was
going on with reference to the new Board schools, and their
advantages or disadvantages when compared with those in which
working-folk's children had hitherto been taught. Clara went to a
Church school, and the expense was greater than the new system
rendered necessary.
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