"Great God!" the words escaped Deronda in a tone so low and solemn that they seemed like a prayer become unconsciously vocal. The agitating impression this forsaken girl was making on him stirred a fibre that lay close to his deepest interest in the fates of women--"perhaps my mother was like this one." The old thought had come now with a new impetus of mingled feeling, and urged that exclamation in which both East and West have for ages concentrated their awe in the presence of inexorable calamity.

"Great God!" the words escaped Deronda like an unconscious prayer. The agitating impression this forsaken girl was making on him stirred his deepest interest in the fates of women- "perhaps my mother was like this one," he thought.
