“Very soon. Of course there are preparations to make; you should have a travelling companion. I don’t mean a tutor,—you are too clever and too steady to need one,—but a pleasant, sensible, well-mannered young person of your own age.”
“My own age,—male or female?”
Sir Peter tried hard to frown. The utmost he could do was to reply gravely, “FEMALE! If I said you were too steady to need a tutor, it was because you have hitherto seemed little likely to be led out of your way by female allurements. Among your other studies may I inquire if you have included that which no man has ever yet thoroughly mastered,—the study of women?”
“Certainly. Do you object to my catching another trout?”
“Trout be—blessed, or the reverse. So you have studied woman. I should never have thought it. Where and when did you commence that department of science?”
“When? ever since I was ten years old. Where? first in your own house, then at college. Hush!—a bite,” and another trout left its native element and alighted on Sir Peter’s nose, whence it was solemnly transferred to the basket.
“At ten years old, and in my own house! That flaunting hussy Jane, the under-housemaid—”
“Jane! No, sir. Pamela, Miss Byron, Clarissa,—females in Richardson, who, according to Dr. Johnson, ‘taught the passions to move at the command of virtue.’ I trust for your sake that Dr. Johnson did not err in that assertion, for I found all these females at night in your own private apartments.”
“Oh!” said Sir Peter, “that’s all?”
“All I remember at ten years old,” replied Kenelm.