"Hum!" said the Colonel, dryly; "a petticoat!"
"Et cetera," suggested Walter, meekly; and we think he was right, for a petticoat has never in our day been the only garment worn by females, nor even the most characteristic: fishermen wear petticoats, and don't wear bonnets.
"Who is she, sir?" asked the grim Colonel.
"Your niece, father," said Walter, mellifluously, "and the most beautiful girl in Derbyshire."
The Colonel snorted, but didn't condescend to go into the question of beauty.
"Why did my niece retire at sight of me?" was his insidious inquiry.
"Well," said Walter, meekly, "the truth is, some mischief-making fool has been telling her that you have lost all natural affection for your dead sister's child."
The stout Colonel staggered for a moment, snorted, and turned it off. "You and she are very often together, it seems."
"All the better for me," said Walter, stoutly.
"And all the worse for me," retorted the Colonel. And as men gravitate toward their leading grievance, he went off at a tangent, "What do you think my feelings must be, to see my son, my only son, spooning the daughter of my only enemy; of a knave who got on my land on pretense of farming it, but instead of that he burrowed under the soil like a mole, sir; and now the place is defiled with coal dust, the roads are black, the sheep are black, the daisies and buttercups are turning black. There's a smut on your nose, Walter. I forbid you to spoon his daughter, upon pain of a father's curse. My real niece, Julia, is a lady and an heiress, and the beauty of the county. She is the girl for you."
"And how about the seventh commandment?" inquired Walter, putting his hands in his pockets.
"Oh," said the Colonel, indifferently, "you must mind your eye, like other husbands. But in our walk of life it's the man's fault if the woman falls out of the ranks."
"What do you mean, then, if you mean anything at all?"
"I mean this, father. She marries Percy Fitzroy in three weeks; so if I fix my affections on her up to the date of the wedding, shall I not be tempted to continue, and will not a foolish attachment to another man's sweetheart end in a vicious attachment to another man's wife?"
Once more was the Colonel staggered for a moment, and, oh--as the ladies say--is it not gratifying to find that where honest reasons go for nothing, humbug can obtain a moment's hearing? The Colonel admitted there was something in that; but even humbug could not divert him long from his mania. "The only thing to be done," said he, "is to cut him out between this and then. Why, he stands five feet nothing."