"Love ruins us, my dear boy," he said, thinking to preach Richard a lesson, and Richard boisterously broke out—
"The love of Monsieur Francatelli,
It was the ruin of—et cætera."
Hippias blinked, exclaiming, "Really, my dear boy! I never saw you so excited."
"It's the railway! It's the fun, uncle!"
"Ah!" Hippias wagged a melancholy head, "you've got the Golden Bride! Keep her if you can. That's a pretty fable of your father's. I gave him the idea, though. Austin filches a great many of my ideas!"
"Here's the idea in verse, uncle—
'O sunless walkers by the tide!
O have you seen the Golden Bride!
They say that she is fair beyond
All women; faithful, and more fond!'
You know, the young inquirer comes to a group of penitent sinners by the brink of a stream. They howl, and answer:
'Faithful she is, but she forsakes:
And fond, yet endless woe she makes:
And fair! but with this curse she's cross'd;
To know her not till she is lost!'
Then the doleful party march off in single file solemnly, and the fabulist pursues—