“Well, here’s luck, my boy,” shouted his father.
“When th’ fat’s in th’ fire, let it frizzle,” admonished his uncle Frank.
“Fair and softly does it, fair an’ softly does it,” cried his aunt, Frank’s wife, contrary.
“You don’t want to fall over yourself,” said his uncle by marriage. “You’re not a bull at a gate.”
“Let a man have his own road,” said Tom Brangwen testily. “Don’t be so free of your advice—it’s his wedding this time, not yours.”
“’E don’t want many sign-posts,” said his father. “There’s some roads a man has to be led, an’ there’s some roads a boss-eyed man can only follow wi’ one eye shut. But this road can’t be lost by a blind man nor a boss-eyed man nor a cripple—and he’s neither, thank God.”
“Don’t you be so sure o’ your walkin’ powers,” cried Frank’s wife. “There’s many a man gets no further than half-way, nor can’t to save his life, let him live for ever.”
“Why, how do you know?” said Alfred.
“It’s plain enough in th’ looks o’ some,” retorted Lizzie, his sister-in-law.
The youth stood with a faint, half-hearing smile on his face. He was tense and abstracted. These things, or anything, scarcely touched him.