u about Stephen.

UNDERSHAFT [rather wearily] Don't, my dear. Stephen doesn't
interest me.

LADY BRITOMART. He does interest me. He is our son.

UNDERSHAFT. Do you really think so? He has induced us to bring
him into the world; but he chose his parents very incongruously,
I think. I see nothing of myself in him, and less of you.

LADY BRITOMART. Andrew: Stephen is an excellent son, and a most
steady, capable, highminded young man. YOU are simply trying to
find an excuse for disinheriting him.

UNDERSHAFT. My dear Biddy: the Undershaft tradition disinherits
him. It would be dishonest of me to leave the cannon foundry to
my son.

LADY BRITOMART. It would be most unnatural and improper of you to
leave it to anyone else, Andrew. Do you suppose this wicked and
immoral tradition can be kept up for ever? Do you pretend that
Stephen could not carry on the foundry just as well as all the
other sons of the big business houses?

UNDERSHAFT. Yes: he could learn the office routine without
understanding the business, like all the other sons; and the firm
would go on by its own momentum until the real Undershaft--probably
an Italian or a German--would invent a new method and cut him out.

LADY BRITOMART. There is nothing that any Italian or German could
do that Stephen could not do. And Stephen at least has breeding.

UNDERSHAFT. The son of a foundling! nonsense!

LADY BRITOMART. My son, Andrew! And even you may have good blood
in your veins for all you know.

UNDERSHAFT. True. Probably I have. That is another argument in
favor of a foundling.

LADY BRITOMART. Andrew: don't be aggravating. And don't be
wicked. At present you are both.

UNDERSHAFT. This conversation is part of the Undershaft
tradition, Biddy. Every Undershaft's wife has treated him to it
ever since the house was founded. It is mere waste of breath. If
the tradition be ever broken it will be for an abler man than
Stephen.

LADY BRITOMART [pouting] Then go away.

UNDERSHAFT [deprecatory] Go away!

LADY BRITOMART. Yes: go away. If you will do nothing for Stephen,
you are not wanted here. Go to your foundling, whoever he is; and
look after him.

UNDERSHAFT. The fact is, Biddy--

LADY BRITOMART. Don't call me Biddy. I don't call you Andy.

UNDERSHAFT. I will not call my wife Britomart: it is not good
sense. Seriously, my love, the Undershaft tradition has landed me
in a difficulty. I am getting on in years; and my partner Lazarus
has at last made