hink you were such an idiot, my boy."

"Thank you, sir."

"What will her dress cost?"

"I have not the slightest idea."

"I dare say not. Probably she is a horsewoman. As far as I know
anything of your life that is the sphere in which you will have made
the lady's acquaintance."

"She does ride."

"No doubt, and so do you; and it will be very easy to say whither you
will ride together if you are fools enough to get married. I can only
advise you to do nothing of the kind. Is there anything else?"

There was much more to be said if Gerard could succeed in forcing his
father to hear him. Mr. Maule, who had hitherto been standing, seated
himself as he asked that last question, and took up the book which
had been prepared for his morning's delectation. It was evidently
his intention that his son should leave him. The news had been
communicated to him, and he had said all that he could say on the
subject. He had at once determined to confine himself to a general
view of the matter, and to avoid details,--which might be personal to
himself. But Gerard had been specially required to force his father
into details. Had he been left to himself he would certainly have
thought that the conversation had gone far enough. He was inclined,
almost as well as his father, to avoid present discomfort. But when
Miss Palliser had suddenly,--almost suddenly,--accepted him; and when
he had found himself describing the prospects of his life in her
presence and in that of Lady Chiltern, the question of the Maule
Abbey inheritance had of necessity been discussed. At Maule Abbey
there might be found a home for the married couple, and,--so thought
Lady Chiltern,--the only fitting home. Mr. Maule, the father,
certainly did not desire to live there. Probably arrangements might
be made for repairing the house and furnishing it with Adelaide's
money. Then, if Gerard Maule would be prudent, and give up hunting,
and farm a little himself,--and if Adelaide would do her own
housekeeping and dress upon forty pounds a year, and if they would
both live an exemplary, model, energetic, and strictly economical
life, both ends might be made to meet. Adelaide had been quite
enthusiastic as to the forty pounds, and had suggested that she would
do it for thirty. The housekeeping was a matter of course, and the
more so as a leg of mutton roast or boiled would be the beginning
and the end of it. To Adelaide the discussion had been exciting and
pleasurable, a