his life had been,--how devoid
of other interests than that of the public service to which he had
devoted himself. He was thinking of this when he told his son that
he had neither ploughed and sowed or been the owner of sheep or oxen.
He often thought of this, when he heard those around him talking of
the sports, which, though he condemned them as the employments of a
life, he now regarded wistfully, hopelessly as far as he himself was
concerned, as proper recreations for a man of wealth. Silverbridge
should have it all, if he could arrange it. The one thing necessary
was a fitting wife;--and the fitting wife had been absolutely chosen
by Silverbridge himself.

It may be conceived, therefore, that he was again unhappy. He
had already been driven to acknowledge that these children of
his,--thoughtless, restless, though they seemed to be,--still had a
will of their own. In all which how like they were to their mother!
With her, however, his word, though it might be resisted, had never
lost its authority. When he had declared that a thing should not
be done, she had never persisted in saying that she would do it.
But with his children it was otherwise. What power had he over
Silverbridge,--or for the matter of that, even over his daughter?
They had only to be firm and he knew that he must be conquered.

"I thought that you liked her," Silverbridge had said to him. How
utterly unconscious, thought the Duke, must the young man have
been of all that his position required of him when he used such an
argument! Liked her! He did like her. She was clever, accomplished,
beautiful, well-mannered,--as far as he knew endowed with all good
qualities! Would not many an old Roman have said as much for some
favourite Greek slave,--for some freedman whom he would admit to his
very heart? But what old Roman ever dreamed of giving his daughter to
the son of a Greek bondsman! Had he done so, what would have become
of the name of a Roman citizen? And was it not his duty to fortify
and maintain that higher, smaller, more precious pinnacle of rank on
which Fortune had placed him and his children?

Like her! Yes! he liked her certainly. He had by no means always
found that he best liked the companionship of his own order. He had
liked to feel around him the free battle of the House of Commons. He
liked the power of attack and defence in carrying on which an English
politician cares nothing for rank. He liked to remember that the
son of any t