“We don’t call them the people,” observed Hyacinth, reflecting the next instant that his remark was a little primitive.
“I suppose you call them the wretches, the scoundrels!” Rose Muniment suggested, laughing merrily.
“All the things, but not all the brains,” her brother said.
“No indeed, aren’t they stupid?” exclaimed her ladyship. “All the same, I don’t think they’d all go abroad.”
“Go abroad?”
“I mean like the French nobles who emigrated so much. They’d stay at home and resist; they’d make more of a fight. I think they’d fight very hard.”
“I’m delighted to hear it, and I’m sure they’d win!” cried Rosy.
“They wouldn’t collapse, don’t you know,” Lady Aurora continued. “They’d struggle till they were beaten.”
“And you think they’d be beaten in the end?” Hyacinth asked.
“Oh dear, yes,” she replied with a familiar confidence at which he was greatly surprised. “But of course one hopes it won’t happen.”