“He is believed to be so.”
“And Jack is his heir.”
“Certainly—he has no other child; though it is not easy to say what so singular a being may do with his money.”
“I hope he will disinherit Jack!”
“You surprise me, Anna! You, who are so mild and reasonable, to wish such a misfortune to befall our young friend John Goldencalf!” I gazed upward in astonishment at this extraordinary speech of Anna, and at the moment I would have given all my interest in the fortune in question to have seen her face (most of her body was out of the window, for I heard her again rustling the bush above my head), in order to judge of her motive by its expression; but an envious rose grew exactly in the only spot where it was possible to get a glimpse.
“Why do you wish so cruel a thing?” resumed Dr. Etherington, a little earnestly.
“Because I hate stock-jobbing and its riches, father. Were Jack poorer, it seems to me he would be better esteemed.”
As this was uttered the dear girl drew back, and I then perceived that I had mistaken her cheek for one of the largest and most blooming of the flowers. Dr. Etherington laughed, and I distinctly heard him kiss the blushing face of his daughter. I think I would have given up my hopes in another million to have been the rector at Tenthpig at that instant.
“If that be all, child,” he answered, “set thy heart at rest. Jack’s money will never bring him into contempt unless through the use he may make of it. Alas! Anna, we live in an age of corruption and cupidity! Generous motives appear to be lost sight of in the general desire of gain; and he who would manifest a disposition to a pure and disinterested philanthropy is either distrusted as a hypocrite or derided as a fool. The accursed revolution among our neighbors the French has quite unsettled opinions, and religion itself has tottered in the wild anarchy of theories to which it has given rise. There is no worldly advantage that has been more austerely denounced by the divine writers than riches, and yet it is fast rising to be the god of the ascendant. To say nothing of an hereafter, society is getting to be corrupted by it to the core, and even respect for birth is yielding to the mercenary feeling.”
“And do you not think pride of birth, father, a mistaken prejudice as well as pride of riches?”