mind had
encountered opposition. But in the eighties there was noted in the
register of the same church the burial of "Anne, nee Carfax, wife of
Sylvanus Stone." In that "nee Carfax" there was, to those who knew,
something more than met the eye. It summed up the mother of Cecilia and
Bianca, and, in more subtle fashion, Cecilia and Bianca, too. It summed
up that fugitive, barricading look in their bright eyes, which, though
spoken of in the family as "the Carfax eyes," were in reality far from
coming from old Mr. Justice Carfax. They had been his wife's in turn,
and had much annoyed a man of his decided character. He himself had
always known his mind, and had let others know it, too; reminding his
wife that she was an impracticable woman, who knew not her own mind; and
devoting his lawful gains to securing the future of his progeny. It
would have disturbed him if he had lived to see his grand-daughters and
their times. Like so many able men of his generation, far-seeing enough
in practical affairs, he had never considered the possibility that the
descendants of those who, like himself, had laid up treasure for their
children's children might acquire the quality of taking time, balancing
pros and cons, looking ahead, and not putting one foot down before
picking the other up. He had not foreseen, in deed, that to wobble might
become an art, in order that, before anything was done, people might know
the full necessity for doing some thing, and how impossible it would be
to do indeed, foolish to attempt to do--that which would fully meet the
case. He, who had been a man of action all his life, had not perceived
how it would grow to be matter of common instinct that to act was to
commit oneself, and that, while what one had was not precisely what one
wanted, what one had not (if one had it) would be as bad. He had never
been self-conscious--it was not the custom of his generation--and, having
but little imagination, had never suspected that he was laying up that
quality for his descendants, together with a competence which secured
them a comfortable leisure.

Of all the persons in his grand-daughter's studio that afternoon, that
stray sheep Mr. Purcey would have been, perhaps, the only one whose
judgments he would have considered sound. No one had laid up a
competence for Mr. Purcey, who had been in business from the age of
twenty.

It is uncertain whether the mere fact that he was not in his own fold
kept this