equanimity."

Rain is at that moment running down the painted panes of the Surrenden
casements, and driving across the lawns and terraces of the Surrenden
gardens. It makes Usk very cross: all the ensilage in the world will not
console him for ripening corn beaten down in all directions, and young
families of pheasants dying of cramp and pip in their ferny homes.

"Dig a big pit and cram your soaked grass into it: very well, I don't
say no," he growls. "But what about your mildewed wheat? And where
should we be if we had to undergo a blockade? I'm not against making
more pasture, grazing's all very well; but if there's a war big enough
to sweep the seas of the grain-ships that come to us from the Colonies
and the United States, where shall we be if we've nothing to eat but our
own beef and mutton? Beef and mutton are solid food, but I believe we
should all go mad on them if we'd no bread to eat too."

"I'm all for pasture," replies Brandolin; "and as the British Isles can
never, under any cultivation whatever, feed all their population, we may
as well dedicate ourselves to what is picturesque. I am fascinated by
Laveleye's portrait of England when she shall have turned grazier
exclusively: it is lovely: 'L'Angleterre redeviendra ce qu'elle etait
sous les Tudors, un grand parc vert, parseme d'ormes et de chenes, ou
b[oe]ufs et moutons se promeneront dans des prairies sans limites.'"

"'Prairies sans limites?' when the land's to be all sliced up in little
bits between peasant proprietors!" says Usk.

"I don't think Laveleye believes in peasant proprietors, though he is a
professor of social economy."

"Social economy!" says Usk, with a groan. "Oh, I know that fool of a
word! In plain English, it means ruin all round, and fortune for a few
d----d manufacturers."

"The d----d manufacturer is the principal outcome of two thousand
centuries of Christianity, civilization, and culture. The result is not
perfectly satisfactory or encouraging, one must admit," says Brandolin,
as he reaches down a volume of eighteenth-century memoirs, and adds,
with entire irrelevancy to manufacturers or memoirs, "Is she really as
handsome as your children tell me?"

"Who?" asks Usk. "Oh, the Russian woman: yes, very good-looking. Yes,
she was here at Easter, and she turned their heads."

"Has she any lovers older than Babe?"

"She has left 'em in Russia if she has."

"A convenient distance to leave anything at: Italy and Russia are th