"You forget that he is going to marry you," replied her host; "surely that is a career sufficient to satisfy even the most ambitious of men, and to occupy the time of the most industrious."
"Of course it is. What I ought to have said was that I wanted Harry to have a recreation."
"Recreation means variety of occupation," suggested Lord Kesterton, "and he would hardly find that—after marriage—at the War Office."
"Do you think he will find it in New North Wales?"
"Most certainly; because there, in his official life, his duty will be to rule."
"You are very rude," laughed Lady Eleanor; "I shall talk to Mr. Madderley instead, and ask him if he doesn't think that Gravesend is a very depressing title for a young man to come into."
"It suggests the quintessence of finality," replied the artist, "there is no doubt of that."
Lord Gravesend's fiancée nodded. "I mean to alter it, and to call him 'the Lord Harry' instead. That would be prettier, don't you think?"
"Far prettier; also more colloquial, and I love colloquialisms. They are the next best thing to stories in dialect. A story in dialect invariably does me good, because I do not understand it."
"Then do you think that it is the things we don't understand that do us good?" queried the lady.