‘Believe it! I know it!’
‘He is very young,’ said the widow. ‘Youth is a very trying time.’
‘Nothing to do with his youth. It’s the system, the infernal system. If that man had to work for his bread, like everybody else, do you think he would dine off bank notes? No! to be sure he wouldn’t! It’s the system.’
‘Young people are very wild!’ said the widow.
‘Pooh! ma’am. Nonsense! Don’t talk cant. If a man be properly educated, he is as capable at one-and-twenty of managing anything, as at any time in his life; more capable. Look at the men who write “The Screw and Lever;” the first men in the country. Look at them. Not one of age. Look at the man who wrote this article on the aristocracy: young Duncan Macmorrogh. Look at him, I say, the first man in the country by far.’
‘I never heard his name before,’ calmly observed the Duke.
‘Not heard his name? Not heard of young Duncan Macmorrogh, the first man of the day, by far; not heard of him? Go and ask the Marquess of Sheepshead what he thinks of him. Go and ask Lord Two and Two what he thinks of him. Duncan dines with Lord Two and Two every week.’
The Duke smiled, and his companion proceeded.
‘Well, again, look at his friends. There is young First Principles. What a «head that fellow has got! Here, this article on India is by him. He’ll knock up their Charter. He is a clerk in the India House. Up to the detail, you see. Let me read you this passage on monopolies. Then there is young Tribonian Quirk. By G—, what a mind that fellow has got! By G—, nothing but first principles will go down with these fellows! They laugh at anything else. By G—, sir, they look upon the administration of the present day as a parcel of sucking babes! When I was last in town, Quirk told me that he would not give that for all the public men that ever existed! He is keeping his terms at Gray’s Inn. This article on a new Code is by him. Shows as plain as light, that, by sticking close to first principles, the laws of the country might be carried in every man’s waistcoat pocket.’
The coach stopped, and a colloquy ensued.