uld distinguish yourself in the world. You might
represent this county, as your ancestors have done before. I have looked
forward to the proceedings of yesterday as an admirable occasion for
your introduction to your future constituents. Oratory is the talent
most appreciated in a free country, and why should you not be an orator?
Demosthenes says that delivery, delivery, delivery, is the art of
oratory; and your delivery is excellent, graceful, self-possessed,
classical."

"Pardon me, my dear father, Demosthenes does not say delivery,
nor action, as the word is commonly rendered; he says, 'acting, or
stage-play,'--the art by which a man delivers a speech in a feigned
character, whence we get the word hypocrisy. Hypocrisy, hypocrisy,
hypocrisy! is, according to Demosthenes, the triple art of the orator.
Do you wish me to become triply a hypocrite?"

"Kenelm, I am ashamed of you. You know as well as I do that it is only
by metaphor that you can twist the word ascribed to the great Athenian
into the sense of hypocrisy. But assuming it, as you say, to mean not
delivery, but acting, I understand why your debut as an orator was
not successful. Your delivery was excellent, your acting defective.
An orator should please, conciliate, persuade, prepossess. You did the
reverse of all this; and though you produced a great effect, the effect
was so decidedly to your disadvantage that it would have lost you an
election on any hustings in England."

"Am I to understand, my dear father," said Kenelm, in the mournful and
compassionate tones with which a pious minister of the Church reproves
some abandoned and hoary sinner,--"am I to understand that you would
commend to your son the adoption of deliberate falsehood for the gain of
a selfish advantage?"

"Deliberate falsehood! you impertinent puppy!"

"Puppy!" repeated Kenelm, not indignantly but musingly,--"puppy! a
well-bred puppy takes after its parents."

Sir Peter burst out laughing.

Lady Chillingly rose with dignity, shook her gown, unfolded her parasol,
and stalked away speechless.

"Now, look you, Kenelm," said Sir Peter, as soon as he had composed
himself. "These quips and humours of yours are amusing enough to an
eccentric man like myself, but they will not do for the world; and
how at your age, and with the rare advantages you have had in an early
introduction to the best intellectual society, under the guidance of a
tutor acquainted with the new ideas which are to