im visit his nurse so often, and never without his tutor; it was she
who taught him to look forward to your decease; that is just like these
common women. Such a tutor as I have described will deserve 500 pounds
a year. Give it him; and dismiss him if he plays humdrum and doesn't
earn it. Dismiss half a dozen, if necessary, till you get a fellow with
a grain or two of genius for tuition. When the boy is seventeen, what
with his Oriental precocity, and this system of education, he will know
the world as well as a Saxon boy of twenty-one, and that is not saying
much. Then, if his nature is still as wild, get him a large tract in
Australia; cattle to breed, kangaroos to shoot, swift horses to thread
the bush and gallop mighty tracts; he will not shirk business, if it
avoids the repulsive form of sitting down in-doors, and offers itself
in combination with riding, hunting, galloping, cracking of rifles, and
of colonial whips as loud as rifles, and drinking sunshine and
moonshine in that mellow clime, beneath the Southern Cross and the
spangled firmament of stars unknown to us."

His own eyes sparkled like hot coals at this Bohemian picture.

Then he sighed and returned to civilization. "But," said he, "be ready
with eighty thousand pounds for him, that he may enjoy his own way and
join you in barring the entail. I forgot, I must say no more on that
subject; I see it is as offensive--as it is inevitable. Cassandra has
spoken wisely, and, I see, in vain. God bless you both--good-night."

And he rolled out of the room with a certain clumsy importance.

Sir Charles treated all this advice with a polite forbearance while he
was in the room, but on his departure delivered a sage reflection.

"Strange," said he, "that a man so valuable in any great emergency
should be so extravagant and eccentric in the ordinary affairs of life.
I might as well drive to Bellevue House and consult the first gentleman
I met there."

Lady Bassett did not reply immediately, and Sir Charles observed that
her face was very red and her hands trembled.

"Why, Bella," said he, "has all that rhodomontade upset you?"

Lady Bassett looked frightened at his noticing her agitation, and said
that Mr. Rolfe always overpowered her. "He is so large, and so
confident, and throws such new light on things."

"New light! Wild eccentricity always does that; but it is the light of
Jack-o'-lantern. On a great question, so near my heart as this, give me
the steady