_in_,
Eloquent, then you can hob-a-nob with the gentry if it so pleases you;
but _till_ you're in, remember it's the working man as can make or mar
you."

Eloquent's aunt, Miss Gallup, had for many years "kept" the post-office
and general shop in the village of Redmarley; but when her brother
asked her to come and look after his home and his motherless child, she
did not hesitate. She resigned her position of post-mistress, sold the
good-will of her shop, and went to live in Marlehouse at "The Sign of
the Golden Anchor."

She did not lose her interest in Redmarley, however; she had many
friends there, and it was one of the treats of little Eloquent's
childhood to drive there with his aunt "in a shay," to spend the
afternoon in the woods, and have tea afterwards either with the
housekeeper at the "Manshun" or in one of the cottages in the village.

In those days, only one old gentleman lived at the "Manshun." He "kept
himself very much to himself," so aunt said, and Eloquent never saw him
except from an upper window in the Golden Anchor, when he happened to
drive through Marlehouse.

Neither did the little boy ever see much of the interior of the
"Manshun" itself, except the housekeeper's room, which was down a
passage just inside the back entrance.

It was during these visits to the housekeeper at Redmarley that it
first dawned upon Eloquent that there could be two opinions as to the
absolute righteousness of the Liberal Cause. Moreover, he found out
that his aunt's political views were not on all fours with those of his
father. This last discovery was quite a shock to him, and there was
worse in store. For while he sat in solemn silence devouring bread and
jam at the housekeeper's well-spread table, with his own ears he heard
her dare to speak of the Grand Old Man as "that there Gladstone," and
the butler, an imposing gentleman in black, actually described him as
"a snake in the grass."

"It's curious, Miss Gallup," the butler said, thoughtfully, "that your
brother should be that side in politics, and him so well-to-do and all.
If he'd been in the boot trade now, I could have understood it--there's
something in the smell of leather that breeds Radicals like a bad drain
breeds fever; but clothes now, and lining and neck-ties and hosiery,
you'd think they'd have a softening effect on a man. Dissenter, too,
he is, isn't he?"

"My brother's altogether out of the common run," Miss Gallup remarked,
rather hu