Sir Peter burst out laughing.
Lady Chillingly rose with dignity, shook her gown, unfolded her parasol, and stalked away speechless.
“Now, look you, Kenelm,” said Sir Peter, as soon as he had composed himself. “These quips and humours of yours are amusing enough to an eccentric man like myself, but they will not do for the world; and how at your age, and with the rare advantages you have had in an early introduction to the best intellectual society, under the guidance of a tutor acquainted with the new ideas which are to influence the conduct of statesmen, you could have made so silly a speech as you did yesterday, I cannot understand.”
“My dear father, allow me to assure you that the ideas I expressed are the new ideas most in vogue,—ideas expressed in still plainer, or, if you prefer the epithet, still sillier terms than I employed. You will find them instilled into the public mind by ‘The Londoner’ and by most intellectual journals of a liberal character.”
“Kenelm, Kenelm, such ideas would turn the world topsy-turvy.”
“New ideas always do tend to turn old ideas topsy-turvy. And the world, after all, is only an idea, which is turned topsy-turvy with every successive century.”
“You make me sick of the word ‘ideas.’ Leave off your metaphysics and study real life.”
“It is real life which I did study under Mr. Welby. He is the Archimandrite of Realism. It is sham life which you wish me to study. To oblige you I am willing to commence it. I dare say it is very pleasant. Real life is not; on the contrary—dull,” and Kenelm yawned again.
“Have you no young friends among your fellow-collegians?”
“Friends! certainly not, sir. But I believe I have some enemies, who answer the same purpose as friends, only they don’t hurt one so much.”
“Do you mean to say that you lived alone at Cambridge?”
“No, I lived a good deal with Aristophanes, and a little with Conic Sections and Hydrostatics.”
“Books. Dry company.”
“More innocent, at least, than moist company. Did you ever get drunk, sir?”
“Drunk!”
“I tried to do so once with the young companions whom you would commend to me as friends. I don’t think I succeeded, but I woke with a headache. Real life at college abounds with headache.”
“Kenelm, my boy, one thing is clear: you must travel.”
“As you please, sir. Marcus Antoninus says that it is all one to a stone whether it be thrown upwards or downwards. When shall I start?”
“Very soon. Of course there are preparations to make; you should have a travelling companion. I don’t mean a tutor,—you are too clever and too steady to need one,—but a pleasant, sensible, well-mannered young person of your own age.”
“My own age,—male or female?”
Sir Peter tried hard to frown. The utmost he could do was to reply gravely, “FEMALE! If I said you were too steady to need a tutor, it was because you have hitherto seemed little likely to be led out of your way by female allurements. Among your other studies may I inquire if you have included that which no man has ever yet thoroughly mastered,—the study of women?”
“Certainly. Do you object to my catching another trout?”
“Trout be—blessed, or the reverse. So you have studied woman. I should never have thought it. Where and when did you commence that department of science?”
“When? ever since I was ten years old. Where? first in your own house, then at college. Hush!—a bite,” and another trout left its native element and alighted on Sir Peter’s nose, whence it was solemnly transferred to the basket.
“At ten years old, and in my own house! That flaunting hussy Jane, the under-housemaid—”
“Jane! No, sir. Pamela, Miss Byron, Clarissa,—females in Richardson, who, according to Dr. Johnson, ‘taught the passions to move at the command of virtue.’ I trust for your sake that Dr. Johnson did not err in that assertion, for I found all these females at night in your own private apartments.”
“Oh!” said Sir Peter, “that’s all?”
“All I remember at ten years old,” replied Kenelm.
“And at Mr. Welby’s or at college,” proceeded Sir Peter, timorously, “was your acquaintance with females of the same kind?”
Kenelm shook his head. “Much worse: they were very naughty indeed at college.”
“I should think so, with such a lot of young fellows running after them.”
“Very few fellows run after the females. I mean—rather avoid them.”
“So much the better.”
“No, my father, so much the worse; without an intimate knowledge of those females there is little use going to college at all.”
“Explain yourself.”
“Every one who receives a classical education is introduced into their society,—Pyrrha and Lydia, Glycera and Corinna, and many more of the same sort; and then the females in Aristophanes, what do you say to them, sir?”
“Is it only females who lived two thousand or three thousand years ago, or more probably never lived at all, whose intimacy you have cultivated? Have you never admired any real women?”
“Real women! I never met one. Never met a woman who was not a sham, a sham from the moment she is told to be pretty-behaved, conceal her sentiments, and look fibs when she does not speak them. But if I am to learn sham life, I suppose I must put up with sham women.”
“Have you been crossed in love that you speak so bitterly of the sex?”
“I don’t speak bitterly of the sex. Examine any woman on her oath, and she’ll own she is a sham, always has been, and always will be, and is proud of it.”
“I am glad your mother is not by to hear you. You will think differently one of these days. Meanwhile, to turn to the other sex, is there no young man of your own rank with whom you would like to travel?”
“Certainly not. I hate quarrelling.”
“As you please. But you cannot go quite alone: I will find you a good travelling-servant. I must write to town to-day about your preparations, and in another week or so I hope all will be ready. Your allowance will be whatever you like to fix it at; you have never been extravagant, and—boy—I love you. Amuse yourself, enjoy yourself, and come back cured of your oddities, but preserving your honour.”
Sir Peter bent down and kissed his son’s brow. Kenelm was moved; he rose, put his arm round his father’s shoulder, and lovingly said, in an undertone, “If ever I am tempted to do a base thing, may I remember whose son I am: I shall be safe then.” He withdrew his arm as he said this, and took his solitary way along the banks of the stream, forgetful of rod and line.
CHAPTER XIV
THE young man continued to skirt the side of the stream until he reached the boundary pale of the park. Here, placed on a rough grass mound, some former proprietor, of a social temperament, had built a kind of belvidere, so as to command a cheerful view of the high road below. Mechanically the heir of the Chillinglys ascended the mound, seated himself within the belvidere, and leaned his chin on his hand in a thoughtful attitude. It was rarely that the building was honoured by a human visitor: its habitual occupants were spiders. Of those industrious insects it was a well-populated colony. Their webs, darkened with