l find," said
Bobbs, "that young men in our air do not need the restraints which
are necessary to you English. Their fathers and mothers were not soft
and flabby before them, as was the case with yours, I think." Lord
Marylebone looked across the table, I am told, at Sir Kennington
Oval, and nothing afterwards was said about diet.

But a great trouble arose, which, however, rather assisted Jack in
his own prospects in the long-run,--though for a time it seemed to
have another effect. Sir Kennington Oval was much struck by Eva's
beauty, and, living as he did in Crasweller's house, soon had an
opportunity of so telling her. Abraham Grundle was one of the
cricketers, and, as such, was frequently on the ground at Little
Christchurch; but he did not at present go into Crasweller's house,
and the whole fashionable community of Gladstonopolis was beginning
to entertain the opinion that that match was off. Grundle had
been heard to declare most authoritatively that when the day came
Crasweller should be deposited, and had given it as his opinion that
the power did not exist which could withstand the law of Britannula.
Whether in this he preferred the law to Eva, or acted in anger
against Crasweller for interfering with his prospects, or had an idea
that it would not be worth his while to marry the girl while the
girl's father should be left alive, or had gradually fallen into this
bitterness of spirit from the opposition shown to him, I could not
quite tell. And he was quite as hostile to Jack as to Crasweller. But
he seemed to entertain no aversion at all to Sir Kennington Oval;
nor, I was informed, did Eva. I had known that for the last month
Jack's mother had been instant with him to induce him to speak out
to Eva; but he, who hardly allowed me, his father, to open my mouth
without contradicting me, and who in our house ordered everything
about just as though he were the master, was so bashful in the girl's
presence that he had never as yet asked her to be his wife. Now
Sir Kennington had come in his way, and he by no means carried
his modesty so far as to abstain from quarrelling with him. Sir
Kennington was a good-looking young aristocrat, with plenty of words,
but nothing special to say for himself. He was conspicuous for his
cricketing finery, and when got up to take his place at the wicket,
looked like a diver with his diving-armour all on; but Jack said that
he was very little good at the game. Indeed, for mere cricke