JACK.
Good heavens! . . . I had quite forgotten that point. Your decision on the subject of my name is irrevocable, I suppose?
GWENDOLEN.
I never change, except in my affections.
CECILY.
What a noble nature you have, Gwendolen!
JACK.
Then the question had better be cleared up at once. Aunt Augusta, a moment. At the time when Miss Prism left me in the hand-bag, had I been christened already?
LADY BRACKNELL.
Every luxury that money could buy, including christening, had been lavished on you by your fond and doting parents.
JACK.
Then I was christened! That is settled. Now, what name was I given? Let me know the worst.
LADY BRACKNELL.
Being the eldest son you were naturally christened after your father.
JACK.
[Irritably.] Yes, but what was my father’s Christian name?
LADY BRACKNELL.
[Meditatively.] I cannot at the present moment recall what the General’s Christian name was. But I have no doubt he had one. He was eccentric, I admit. But only in later years. And that was the result of the Indian climate, and marriage, and indigestion, and other things of that kind.
JACK.
Algy! Can’t you recollect what our father’s Christian name was?