"Not in his case," replied Armstrong. "On the contrary, I am satisfied he would hail it with a song of thanksgiving, and I think I have observed he is sometimes impatient of the delay."
"It is well his notions are only crazy fancies as absurd as his beard.
His appearance is very heathenish," said Mrs. Bernard.
"Taste, my dear," exclaimed the Judge, "all taste. Why, I have a great mind to wear a beard myself. It would be a prodigious comfort to dispense with the razor in cold winter mornings, to say nothing of the ornament. And now that I think of it, it is just the season to begin."
"You would look like a bear, Mr. Bernard," said his wife.
"It would be too near an imitation of the old Puritans for you,
Judge," said Faith.
"You, at least, my little Puritan," cried the Judge, "would not object. But do not fancy that in avoiding Scylla I must run upon Charybdis. Be sure I would not imitate the trim moustaches and peaked chins of those old dandies, Winthrop and Endicott. I prefer the full flowing style of Wykliffe and Cranmer."
"We should then have two Holdens," exclaimed Mrs. Bernard, "and that would be more than our little village could live through."
"Fancy papa running an opposition beard against Mr. Holden!" said
Anne.
The idea was sufficiently ludicrous to occasion a general laugh, and even Armstrong smiled.
"I am a happy man," said the Judge; "not only mirthful, myself, but the cause of mirth in others. What a beam of light is a smile, what a glory like a sunrise is a laugh!"