row, and you'll like him very much. Won't he, Adelaide?"

"I don't know Mr. Finn's tastes quite so well as you do, Violet. But
Mr. Maule is so harmless that no one can dislike him very much."

"As for being harmless, I'm not so sure," said Lady Chiltern. After
that they all went to bed.

Phineas remained at Harrington Hall till the ninth, on which day he
went to London so that he might be at Tankerville on the tenth. He
rode Lord Chiltern's horses, and took an interest in the hounds, and
nursed the baby. "Now tell me what you think of Gerard Maule," Lady
Chiltern asked him, the day before he started.

"I presume that he is the young man that is dying for Miss Palliser."

"You may answer my question, Mr. Finn, without making any such
suggestion."

"Not discreetly. Of course if he is to be made happy, I am bound at
the present moment to say all good things of him. At such a crisis it
would be wicked to tinge Miss Palliser's hopes with any hue less warm
than rose colour."

"Do you suppose that I tell everything that is said to me?"

"Not at all; but opinions do ooze out. I take him to be a good sort
of a fellow; but why doesn't he talk a bit more?"

"That's just it."

"And why does he pretend to do nothing? When he's out he rides
hard; but at other times there's a ha-ha, lack a-daisical air about
him which I hate. Why men assume it I never could understand. It
can recommend them to nobody. A man can't suppose that he'll gain
anything by pretending that he never reads, and never thinks, and
never does anything, and never speaks, and doesn't care what he has
for dinner, and, upon the whole, would just as soon lie in bed all
day as get up. It isn't that he is really idle. He rides and eats,
and does get up, and I daresay talks and thinks. It's simply a poor
affectation."

"That's your rose colour, is it?"

"You've promised secrecy, Lady Chiltern. I suppose he's well off?"

"He is an eldest son. The property is not large, and I'm afraid
there's something wrong about it."

"He has no profession?"

"None at all. He has an allowance of L800 a year, which in some sort
of fashion is independent of his father. He has nothing on earth to
do. Adelaide's whole fortune is four thousand pounds. If they were to
marry what would become of them?"

"That wouldn't be enough to live on?"

"It ought to be enough,--as he must, I suppose, have the property
some day,--if only he had something to do. What sort of a life would