She was a psychological Dom!

In that way, all Dom/Sub relationships are reversed as the Sub generally has the final say on everything.

I think, as someone with a middling knowledge of Victorian conventions, that picture really brings home his idealization of her, as well as the clear flouting of taboos. Without seeing it, how could we possibly know the astonishing degree to which they both rejected the social and cultural norm? It's not degrading or disrespectful to her, though some people may get their low-minded jollies off it. It shows her as he wanted to see her, and as she was willing to appear for him.

It feels very much as though this woman was not exploited any more than she exploited, living her fantasy as much as he lived his. But the core of her identity, her integrity, was in her self-sufficiency, her pride in her position in the class into which she was born. She could not *imagine* being other than that which she knew herself to be, and in which she had confidence.

Poor things. Both of 'em. Trapped by their fetishes.