"About what, George?"
"I shall go into orders, and take a college living."
"Orders!" said Sir Lionel; and he expressed more surprise and almost more disgust at this idea than at that other one respecting the attorney scheme.
"Yes; I have been long doubting; but I think I have made up my mind."
"Do you mean that you wish to be a parson, and that after taking a double-first?"
"I don't see what the double-first has to do with it, sir. The only objection I have is the system of the establishment. I do not like the established church."
"Then why go into it?" said Sir Lionel, not at all understanding the nature of his son's objection.
"I love our liturgy, and I like the ritual; but what we want is the voluntary principle. I do not like to put myself in a position which I can, in fact, hold whether I do the duties of it or no. Nor do I wish—"
"Well; I understand very little about all that; but, George, I had hoped something better for you. Now, the army is a beggarly profession unless a man has a private fortune; but, upon my word, I look on the church as the worst of the two. A man may be a bishop of course; but I take it he has to eat a deal of dirt first."
"I don't mean to eat any dirt," said the son.