Glasher, Lydia

The beautiful woman, who, nine years before the opening of the story, left her husband and child for Grandcourt. "An impressive woman, whom many would turn to look at again in passing ; her figure was slim and sufficiently tall, her face rather emaciated, so that its sculpturesque beauty was the more pronounced, her crisp hair perfectly black, and her large, anxious eyes also what we call black. Her dress was soberly correct, her age perhaps physically more advanced than the number of years would imply, but hardly less than seven-and-thirty. An uneasy-looking woman." For years after their elopement, Grandcourt remained much attached to her, though his passion eventually burned itself out. Embittered by Grandcourt's failure to marry her, she centres all her feeling on an anxious love for her four children and an intense desire that Grandcourt shall marry her for their sake. When she learns from Mr. Lusk that Grandcourt is courting Gwendolen Harleth, she arranges a meeting with Gwendolen, tells her story, and obtains Gwendolen's promise not to marry Grandcourt. When she learns that in spite of this promise Gwendolen has accepted Grandcourt, she determines to do as much as she can, without harming her children's prospects, to spoil any satisfaction that Gwendolen may feel in the marriage, and on the wedding day sends to her Grandcourt's family diamonds with a bitter note which throws the bride into hysterics.

<em>Daniel Deronda</em>

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