“But I thought such an honour as that wasn’t allowed to any but very very near relations, who—”
“Right, you are quite right, my lady, perfectly right; but there aren’t any nearer relatives than relatives by usurpation. We cannot avoid it; we are slaves of aristocratic custom and must submit.”
The hatchments were unnecessarily generous, each being as large as a blanket, and they were unnecessarily volcanic, too, as to variety and violence of color, but they pleased the earl’s barbaric eye, and they satisfied his taste for symmetry and completeness, too, for they left no waste room to speak of on the house-front.
Lady Rossmore and her daughter assisted at the sitting-up till near midnight, and helped the gentlemen to consider what ought to be done next with the remains. Rossmore thought they ought to be sent home with a committee and resolutions,—at once. But the wife was doubtful. She said:
“Would you send all of the baskets?”
“Oh, yes, all.”
“All at once?”
“To his father? Oh, no—by no means. Think of the shock. No—one at a time; break it to him by degrees.”
“Would that have that effect, father?”
“Yes, my daughter. Remember, you are young and elastic, but he is old. To send him the whole at once might well be more than he could bear. But mitigated—one basket at a time, with restful intervals between, he would be used to it by the time he got all of him. And sending him in three ships is safer anyway. On account of wrecks and storms.”