Jessica: Did I?
Martin: Yes, without reason. So what could I do but whistle mine to the winds?
Jessica: You were too hasty, for I had my reason.
Martin: If it was a good one I'll whistle mine back again.
Jessica: It was this. That no man in a love-tale should be wiser or braver or more beautiful or more happy than the hero; or how can he be the hero? Yet I am sure Hobb is the hero and none of the others, because he is the only one old enough to be married.
Martin: Ambrose in nineteen, and will very soon be twenty.
Jessica: What's nineteen, or even twenty, in a man? Fie! a man's not a man till he comes of age, and the hero's not Ambrose for all his wisdom, though wisdom becomes a hero. Nor Heriot for all his beauty, though a hero should be beautiful. Nor Hugh, who will one day be brave enough for any hero, though now he's but a boy. Nor the happy Lionel, who is only a child—yet I love a gay hero. It's none of these, full though they be of the qualities of heroes. And here is your Hobb with nothing to show but a fondness for roses.
Martin: You deserve to be stood in a corner for that nothing, Mistress Jessica. Your reason was such a bad one that I see I must return to sense if only to teach you a little of it. Did I not say Hobb had a loving heart?
Jessica: But he was plain and simple and patient and contented. Are these things for a hero?
Martin: Mistress Jessica, I will ask you a riddle. What is it—? Oh, but first, I take it you love apple-trees?