omatons; we would
have virtuous women, only for them to be pursued by immoral men.
Peterborough feared, he must say, that we were an inconsequent people.
His residence abroad had so far unhinged him; but a pipe would have
stopped his complainings.

Moved, perhaps, by generous wine, in concert with his longing for
tobacco, he dropped an observation of unwonted shrewdness; he said: 'The
squire, my dear Harry, a most honourable and straightforward country
gentleman, and one of our very wealthiest, is still, I would venture to
suggest, an example of old blood that requires--I study race--varying,
modifying, one might venture to say, correcting; and really, a friend
with more privileges than I possess, would or should throw him a hint
that no harm has been done to the family by an intermixture... old
blood does occasionally need it--you know I study blood--it becomes too
coarse, or, in some cases, too fine. The study of the mixture of blood
is probably one of our great physical problems.'

Peterborough commended me to gratitude for the imaginative and
chivalrous element bestowed on me by a father that was other than a
country squire; one who could be tolerant of innocent habits, and not of
guilty ones--a further glance at the interdicted pipe. I left him almost
whimpering for it.

The contemplation of the curious littleness of the lives of men and
women lived in this England of ours, made me feel as if I looked at them
out of a palace balcony-window; for no one appeared to hope very much or
to fear; people trotted in their different kinds of harness; and I was
amused to think of my heart going regularly in imitation of those about
me. I was in a princely state of mind indeed, not disinclined for a time
to follow the general course of life, while despising it. An existence
without colour, without anxious throbbing, without salient matter for
thought, challenged contempt. But it was exceedingly funny. My aunt
Dorothy, the squire, and Janet submitted to my transparent inward
laughter at them, patiently waiting for me to share their contentment,
in the deluded belief that the hour would come. The principal items of
news embraced the death of Squire Gregory Bulsted, the marriage of this
and that young lady, a legal contention between my grandfather and Lady
Maria Higginson, the wife of a rich manufacturer newly located among
us, on account of a right of encampment on Durstan heath, my grandfather
taking side with the gipsies,