nd to be
comparing the style of agriculture in the district to that to which he had
been trained while pursuing his studies. He slipped past the wayside inn;
he glided by the cottages and gardens at the outskirts of the village; and
then, leaving the more thickly inhabited part on one side, went by a
rickyard. Men were busy in the yard putting up the last load of the
evening, and the farmer in his shirt-sleeves was working among and
directing the rest. The bicyclist without a glance rode on, and shortly
after reached the lodge gates. They were open, in anticipation of his
arrival.

He rode up the long drive, across the park, under the old elms, and
alighted at the mansion before the dinner bell rang, much to his relief;
for his host had more than one daughter, and Phillip liked to arrange his
toilet to perfection before he joined their society. His twenty-five-guinea
dressing-case, elaborately fitted up--too completely indeed, for he had no
use for the razor--soon enabled him to trim and prepare for the
dining-room. His five-guinea coat, elegant studs, spotless shirt and
wristbands, valuable seal ring on one finger, patent leather boots,
keyless watch, eyeglass, gold toothpick in one pocket, were all carefully
selected, and in the best possible style. Mr. Phillip--he would have
scorned the boyish 'master'--was a gentleman, from the perfumed locks
above to the polished patent leather below. There was _ton_ in his very
air, in the 'ah, ah,' of his treble London tone of voice, the antithesis
of the broad country bass. He had a firm belief in the fitness of
things--in the unities, so to speak, of suit, action, and time.

When his team were struggling to force the ball by kick, or other
permitted means, across the tented field, Phillip was arrayed in accurate
football costume. When he stood on the close-mown lawn within the
white-marked square of tennis and faced the net, his jacket was barred or
striped with scarlet. Then there was the bicycle dress, the morning coat,
the shooting jacket, and the dinner coat, not to mention the Ulster or
Connaught overcoat, the dust coat, and minor items innumerable. Whether
Phillip rolled in the mire at football, or bestrode a bicycle, or sat down
to snow-white tablecloth and napkin, he conscientiously dressed the part.
The very completeness of his prescribed studies--the exhaustive character
of the curriculum-naturally induced a frame of mind not to be satisfied
with anything short of ab