“Chaste!” persisted Mark, “A beggar!” screamed his father. “Industrious, willing, cheerful!” continued Mark, with stern emphasis and heightened colour.
“A beggar!” reiterated Wilton, foaming at the mouth.
“Handsome, intelligent, and good!” shouted Mark, elevating his voice to a pitch which o’er topped his father’s excited tone.
“Had she all the cardinal virtues and the beauty of a seraph, she is still a low-born beggar, and, therefore, cannot be admitted into my family, to mingle with its blood, to take her place by my children’s side as their equal!” cried Wilton, vehemently. “If she is in want, I will assist her cheerfully, gladly. If she wishes to be settled in life, choosing some honest young man, her equal, for her life-companion, I will present her with a dowry. Beyond that limit it is the most insane folly to expect me to move.”
“Am I to understand, sir, that virtue and truth, industry, purity, and integrity weigh nothing in the scale when placed against birth and station?” asked Mark, sternly.
“In such a case as this to which you would apply it, I say certainly not. The veriest rag-collector may possess all these qualifications, but, therefore, am I to admit her into my family as my daughter.”
“Yet your objection springs only from a sense of worldly distinctions.”
“A most refined sense, boy.”
“But after death, sir, at the great Judgment Day, what will weigh against the virtues I have named?—will birth and station cope with them then?”
Mark spoke with startling emphasis, for he wished that his words should have a strong effect upon his father.