Was Gerald, the orphan of Fiddler’s Ranch, to be always the spoilt child of prosperity and the creature of modern life, with more aspirations than he saw how to fulfil, hampered as he was by duties, scruples, and affections?
CHAPTER III. — DARBY AND JOAN
My reason haply more
To bandy word for word and frown for frown;
But now I see our lances are but straws!
SHAKESPEARE.
Lancelot saw his brother’s doctors the next morning, and communicated to his wife the upshot of the interview when they were driving to their meeting in Mrs. Grinstead’s victoria, each adorned with a big bunch of primroses.
“Two doctors! and not Tom,” said Gertrude.
“Both Brownlows. Tom knows them well, and wrote. One lives at the East-end, and is sheet anchor to Whittingtonia. He began with Clement, but made the case over to the cousin, the fashionable one, when we made the great removal.”
“So they consulted?”
“And fairly see the way out of the wood, though not by any means quit of it, poor Tina; but there’s a great deal to be thankful for,” said Lance, with a long breath.
“Indeed there is!” said the wife, with a squeeze of the hand. “But is there any more to be feared?”