"We will discuss what you like, Frank, but you must not touch the young lady's name, we will leave that out of the question."
"You have asked me to be the witness of your marriage," said Sir Frank, "and that entitles me to speak my mind. I do speak it, frankly, honestly, plainly, as I should thank God for any friend to speak to a brother of my own if he felt inclined to make a simpleton of himself."
"I call myself a sensible man to marry for love, not a simpleton," said Lord Chandos grandly.
"My dear Lance," said his friend, "you make just this one mistake; you are not a man at all, you are a boy."
He stopped suddenly, for the young lord looked at him with a defiant, fierce face.
"You must not say that again, Frank, or we shall be friends no longer."
"I do not want to offend you, Lance; but you are really too young to think of marriage. Your tastes are not formed yet; that which pleases you now you will dislike in six or ten years' time. I assure you that if you marry this farmer's niece now, in ten years' time you will repent it in sackcloth and ashes. She is not fit, either by manner, education, or anything else, to be your mother's daughter, and you know it; you know that when the glamour of her beauty is over you will wonder at your own madness and folly. Be warned in time."
"You may as well reason with a madman as a man in love," said the young lordling, "and I am in love."
"And you are mad," said Sir Frank, quietly; "one day you will know how mad."
Lord Chandos laughed.