'Where did you pick up that adage?' asked Felix.
'A prophecy, a prophecy!' cried Angela. 'What fun! I shall hold up my head more than ever, now we have a saw of our own! What fun!'
'Where did you hear it?' repeated Cherry, who as well as Stella looked discomfited.
'I did not hear it,' said Clement, 'the people were far too polite to tell me; but it was administered to Somers by way of warning, after some eccentric proceedings in the boat with Bear. They say an Underwood is drowned in every generation—I suppose since the sacrilege.'
'Prove the fact,' said Felix.
'Somers and I did try to make out,' said Clement, 'between registers and monuments. We found one Lancelot in 1750, with a note "Drowned" attached to his name, and a conglomeration of urns and water-nymphs—Leston and Ewe, I presume—scrambling about his monument in the south transept; and the old Squire had told me that the crayon young lady in a cap in the library was our old great-uncle's intended, but was drowned in crossing the ferry at Ewmouth, before the bridge was built. She is not very pretty; and I was going to have put a photograph in her place, but it seemed to me profane, when she had hung there so many years for the poor old faithful lover to look at.'
'The Ewe seems to have been in overhaste to claim its due, before she was an Underwood,' said Angela.
'Quite enough for an adage,' said John; 'one real Underwood, and one intended.'
'However, as I do not mean the rivers to get their due through any fool-hardiness,' said Felix, 'you must attend to my rule.'
'And I think it renders boating reasonably safe,' added Clement. 'There are no holes, and the only danger is when there has been a good deal of rain to make the currents strong; otherwise it is quite safe for a tolerable swimmer. I learnt at Cambridge, and Bear is a perfect cork; but I did not know you could swim, Fee.'