irst, and settled your speech
afterwards," suggested his wife.

"Oh dear, no! that wouldn't do at all; after all, you know, between you
and me, the facts don't go for much; all we want is, to denounce them;
any line of argument, if it is ingenious enough, will do; lay on the big
words thickly--that's what your constituents like. Law bless you! _they_
don't read the blue books; they'll take my word for granted if I say they
are full of lies; it would be a comfort, however, if I could find a few.
Of course, my dear, this is only between you and me."

A man is not always heroic to the wife of his bosom. Mrs. Miller went
her way and left him to his righteous struggle among the Patagonian
blue-books. After all, she said to herself, it had been her duty to
inform him of his daughter's conduct, but it was needless to discuss
the question further with him. He was incapable of approaching it from
her own point of view. It would be better for her now to go her own way
independently of him. She had always been accustomed to manage things her
own way. It was nothing new to her.

Later in the day she attempted to wrest a promise from Beatrice that
she would hold no further communication with the prohibited lover. But
Beatrice would give no such promise.

"Is it likely that I should promise such a thing?" she asked her mother,
indignantly.

"You would do so if you knew what your duty to your mother was."

"I have other duties besides those to you, mamma; when one has promised
to marry a man, one is surely bound to consider him a little. If I have
the chance of meeting him, I shall certainly take it."

"I shall take very good care that you have no such chances, Beatrice."

"Very well, mamma; you will, of course, do as you think best."

It was in consequence of these and sundry subsequent stormy conversations
that Mr. Herbert Pryme suddenly discovered that he had a very high regard
and affection for Mr. Albert Gisburne, the vicar of Tripton, the same
to whom once Vera's relations had wished to unite her.

The connection between Mr. Gisburne and Herbert Pryme was a slender one;
he had been at college with an elder brother of his, who had died in his
(Herbert's) childhood. He did not indeed very clearly recollect what this
elder brother had been like; but having suddenly called to mind that,
during the course of his short visit to Shadonake, he had discovered the
fact of the college friendship, of which, indeed, Mr. Gisburne ha