‘Take the matter in your own hands, Frank,’ said the Honourable John, seeing the impression that he had made.  ’Of course the governor knows very well that you won’t put up with such a stable as that.  Lord bless you!  I have heard that when he married my aunt, and that was when he was about your age, he had the best stud in the whole county; and then he was in Parliament before he was three-and-twenty.’

‘His father, you know, died when he was very young,’ said Frank.

’Yes; I know he had a stroke of luck that doesn’t fall to everyone; but—­’

Young Frank’s face grew dark now instead of red.  When his cousin submitted to him the necessity of having more than two horses for his own use he could listen to him; but when the same monitor talked of the chance of a father’s death as a stroke of luck, Frank was too much disgusted to be able pass it over with indifference.  What! was he thus to think of his father, whose face was always lighted up with pleasure when his boy came near to him, and so rarely bright at any other time?  Frank had watched his father closely enough to be aware of this; he knew how his father delighted in him; he had had cause to guess that his father had many troubles, and that he strove hard to banish the memory of them when his son was with him.  He loved his father truly, purely, and thoroughly, liked to be with him, and would be proud to be his confidant.  Could he listen quietly while his cousin spoke of the chance of his father’s death as a stroke of luck?

’I shouldn’t think it a stroke of luck, John.  I should think it the greatest misfortune in the world.’

It is so difficult for a young man to enumerate sententiously a principle of morality, or even an expression of ordinary good feeling, without giving himself something of a ridiculous air, without assuming something of a mock grandeur!

‘Oh, of course, my dear fellow,’ said the Honourable John, laughing; ’that’s a matter of course.  We all understand that without saying it.  Porlock, of course, would feel exactly the same about the governor; but if the governor were to walk, I think Porlock would console himself with the thirty thousand a year.’

’I don’t know what Porlock would do; he’s always quarrelling with my uncle, I know.  I only spoke of myself; I never quarrelled with my father, and I hope I never shall.’

’All right, my lad of wax, all right.  I dare say you won’t be tried; but it you are, you’ll find before six months are over, that it’s a very nice thing to master of Greshamsbury.’

‘I’m sure I shouldn’t find anything of the kind.’

’Very well, so be it.  You wouldn’t do as young Hatherly did, at Hatherly Court, in Gloucestershire, when his father kicked the bucket.  You know Hatherly, don’t you?’

‘No; I never saw him.’