"How little changed your boy is!" she said, when they were seated near to each other, with their coffee-cups between them.

"No; he does not change quickly; and, as you say, he is a boy still in many things. I do not know whether it may not be better that it should be so."

"I did not mean to call him a boy in that sense," said Lady Mason.

"But you might; now your son is quite a man."

"Poor Lucius! yes; in his position it is necessary. His little bit of property is already his own; and then he has no one like Sir Peregrine to look out for him. Necessity makes him manly."

"He will be marrying soon, I dare say," suggested Mrs. Orme.

"Oh, I hope not. Do you think that early marriages are good for young men?"

"Yes, I think so. Why not?" said Mrs. Orme, thinking of her own year of married happiness. "Would you not wish to see Lucius marry?"

"I fancy not. I should be afraid lest I should become as nothing to him. And yet I would not have you think that I am selfish."

"I am sure that you are not that. I am sure that you love him better than all the world besides. I can feel what that is myself."

"But you are not alone with your boy as I am. If he were to send me from him, there would be nothing left for me in this world."

"Send you from him! Ah, because Orley Farm belongs to him. But he would not do that; I am sure he would not."

"He would do nothing unkind; but how could he help it if his wife wished it? But nevertheless I would not keep him single for that reason;--no, nor for any reason if I knew that he wished to marry.

But it would be a blow to me."

"I sincerely trust that Peregrine may marry early," said Mrs. Orme, perhaps thinking that babies were preferable either to rats or foxes.

"Yes, it would be well I am sure, because you have ample means, and the house is large; and you would have his wife to love."

"If she were nice it would be so sweet to have her for a daughter. I also am very much alone, though perhaps not so much as you are, Lady Mason."

"I hope not--for I am sometimes very lonely."

"I have often thought that."

"But I should be wicked beyond everything if I were to complain, seeing that Providence has given me so much that I had no right to expect. What should I have done in my loneliness if Sir Peregrine's hand and door had never been opened to me?" And then for the next half-hour the two ladies held sweet converse together, during which we will go back to the gentlemen over their wine.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Over their Wine.]

"Are you drinking claret?" said Sir Peregrine, arranging himself and his bottles in the way that was usual to him. He had ever been a moderate man himself, but nevertheless he had a business-like way of going to work after dinner, as though there was a good deal to be done before the drawing-room could be visited.

"No more wine for me, sir," said Lucius.

"No wine!" said Sir Peregrine the elder.

"Why, Mason, you'll never get on if that's the way with you," said Peregrine the younger.

"I'll try at any rate," said the other.

"Water-drinker, moody thinker," and Peregrine sang a word or two from an old drinking-song.

"I am not quite sure of that. We Englishmen I suppose are the moodiest thinkers in all the world, and yet we are not so much given to water-drinking as our lively neighbours across the Channel."

Sir Peregrine said nothing more on the subject, but he probably thought that his young friend would not be a very comfortable neighbour. His present task, however, was by no means that of teaching him to drink, and he struck off at once upon the business he had undertaken. "So your mother tells me that you are going to devote all your energies to farming."

"Hardly that, I hope. There is the land, and I mean to see what I can do with it. It is not much, and I intend to combine some other occupation with it."

"You will find that two hundred acres of land will give you a good deal to do;--that is if you mean to make money by it."

"I certainly hope to do that,--in the long run."

"It seems to me the easiest thing in the world," said Peregrine.

"You'll find out your mistake some day; but with Lucius Mason it is very important that he should make no mistake at the commencement.

For a country gentleman I know no prettier amus.e.m.e.nt than experimental farming;--but then a man must give up all idea of making his rent out of the land."

"I can't afford that," said Lucius.

"No; and that is why I take the liberty of speaking to you. I hope that the great friendship which I feel for your mother will be allowed to stand as my excuse."

"I am very much obliged by your kindness, sir; I am indeed."

"The truth is, I think you are beginning wrong. You have now been to Liverpool, to buy guano, I believe."

"Yes, that and some few other things. There is a man there who has taken out a patent--"

"My dear fellow, if you lay out your money in that way, you will never see it back again. Have you considered in the first place what your journey to Liverpool has cost you?"

"Exactly nine and sixpence per cent. on the money that I laid out there. Now that is not much more than a penny in the pound on the sum expended, and is not for a moment to be taken into consideration in comparison with the advantage of an improved market."

There was more in this than Sir Peregrine had expected to encounter.

He did not for a moment doubt the truth of his own experience or the folly and the danger of the young man's proceedings; but he did doubt his own power of proving either the one or the other to one who so accurately computed his expenses by percentages on his outlay.

Peregrine opened his eyes and sat by, wondering in silence. What on earth did Mason mean by an improved market?

"I am afraid then," said the baronet, "that you must have laid out a large sum of money."

"A man can't do any good, Sir Peregrine, by h.o.a.rding his capital. I don't think very much of capital myself--"

"Don't you?"

"Not of the theory of capital;--not so much as some people do; but if a man has got it, of course it should be expended on the trade to which it is to be applied."

"But some little knowledge--some experience is perhaps desirable before any great outlay is made."

"Yes; some little knowledge is necessary,--and some great knowledge would be desirable if it were accessible;--but it is not, as I take it."

"Long years, perhaps, devoted to such pursuits--"