time to time, "Poor little thing!" and deeply
hoped she would not be unhappy.

A showman once (a novice in his art, or ambitious beyond the mark), after
a successful exhibition of his dolls, handed them to the company, with
the observation, "satisfy yourselves, ladies and gentlemen." The latter,
having satisfied themselves that the capacity of the lower limbs was
extraordinary, returned them, disenchanted. That showman did ill. But I
am not imitating him. I do not wait till after the performance, when it
is too late to revive illusion. To avoid having to drop the curtain, I
choose to explain an act on which the story hinges, while it is
advancing: which is, in truth, an impulse of character. Instead of his
being more of a puppet, this hero is less wooden than he was. Certainly I
am much more in awe of him.

CHAPTER XIV

Mr. Pole was one of those men whose characters are read off at a glance.
He was neat, insignificant, and nervously cheerful; with the eyes of a
bird, that let you into no interior. His friends knew him thoroughly. His
daughters were never in doubt about him. At the period of the purchase of
Brookfield he had been excitable and feverish, but that was ascribed to
the projected change in his habits, and the stern necessity for an
occasional family intercommunication on the subject of money. He had a
remarkable shyness of this theme, and reversed its general treatment; for
he would pay, but would not talk of it. If it had to be discussed with
the ladies, he puffed, and blinked, and looked so much like a culprit
that, though they rather admired him for what seemed to them the germ of
a sense delicate above his condition, they would have said of any man
they had not known so perfectly, that he had painful reasons for wishing
to avoid it. Now that they spoke to him of Besworth, assuring him that
they were serious in their desire to change their residence, the fit of
shyness was manifested, first in outrageous praise of Brookfield, which
was speedily and inexplicably followed by a sort of implied assent to the
proposition to depart from it. For Besworth displayed numerous advantages
over Brookfield, and to contest one was to plunge headlong into the money
question. He ventured to ask his daughters what good they expected from
the change. They replied that it was simply this: that one might live
fifty years at Brookfield and not get such a circle as in two might be
established at Besworth. They were rest