For these are we made fathers, and for these
May challenge duty on our children’s part.
Obedience is the sacrifice of angels,
Whose form you carry.”
Shakespeare.
THE squire was seated in his well-furnished and luxurious library, by the side of a handsome reflector lamp, with a book written by a popular free-thinker on his knees, for in works of a kindred sceptical character the thoughtful but cynical student had latterly taken great delight.
“Well, Master Philip,” said he, “you keep late hours, and return as stealthily as if you had been keeping an assignation.” Here he lifted his shaggy eyebrows, and peered into his son’s ingenuous face, into which this chance home-thrust brought a rush of blood, and that “index of the mind” grew as red as the crimson curtains which hung in heavy folds behind him.
The squire’s suspicious nature was instantly aroused. Laying down his book he rose from his seat, and stretching out his hand in solemn earnest, he said,—
“Son Philip, you will not be other than a gentleman? You will not sully your father’s name? You will not dim the honour of an ancestry which has held its own with the noblest through a hundred generations? You will not grieve your father by a base and unworthy deed? In the day you do, you’ll”—here the firm lip quivered—“you’ll break his heart!”