"No man is perfect!" said my uncle sententiously. "But seriously, you are now the male hope of the family—you are now—" my uncle stopped, and his face darkened. I saw that he thought of his son, that mysterious son! And looking at him tenderly, I observed that his deep lines had grown deeper, his iron-gray hair more gray. There was the trace of recent suffering on his face; and though he had not spoken to us a word of the business on which he had left us, it required no penetration to perceive that it had come to no successful issue.
My uncle resumed—"Time out of mind, every generation of our house has given one soldier to his country. I look round now: only one branch is budding yet on the old tree; and—"
"Ah! uncle. But what would they say? Do you think I should not like to be a soldier? Don't tempt me!"
My uncle had recourse to his snuff-box; and at that moment, unfortunately perhaps for the laurels that might otherwise have wreathed the brows of Pisistratus of England, private conversation was stopped by the sudden and noisy entrance of Uncle Jack. No apparition could have been more unexpected.
"Here I am, my dear friends. How d'ye do—how are you all? Captain de Caxton, yours heartily. Yes, I am released, thank heaven! I have given up the drudgery of that pitiful provincial paper. I was not made for it. An ocean in a teacup! I was indeed—little, sordid, narrow interests—and I, whose heart embraces all humanity. You might as well turn a circle into an isolated triangle."
"Isosceles!" said my father, sighing as he pushed aside his notes, and very slowly becoming aware of the eloquence that destroyed all chance of further progress that night in the great book. "Isosceles triangle, Jack Tibbets—not isolated."
"Isosceles or isolated, it is all one," said Uncle Jack, as he rapidly performed three evolutions, by no means consistent with his favourite theory of 'the greatest happiness of the greatest number:'—first, he emptied into the cup which he took from my mother's hands, half the thrifty contents of a London cream-jug; secondly, he reduced the circle of a muffin, by the abstraction of two triangles, to as nearly an isosceles as possible; and thirdly, striding towards the fire, lighted in consideration of Captain de Caxton, and hooking his coat-tails under his arms, while he sipped his tea, he permitted another circle peculiar to humanity wholly to eclipse the luminary it approached.
"Isolated or isosceles, it is all the same thing. Man is made for his fellow creatures. I had long been disgusted with the interference of those selfish Squirearchs. Your departure decided me. I have concluded negotiations with a London firm of spirit and capital, and extended views of philanthopy. On Saturday last I retired from the service of the oligarchy. I am now in my true capacity of protector of the million. My prospectus is printed—here it is in my pocket.—Another cup of tea, sister, a little more cream, and another muffin. Shall I ring?" Having disembarrassed himself of his cup and saucer, Uncle Jack then drew forth from his pocket a damp sheet of printed paper. In large capitals stood out "The Anti-Monopoly Gazette, or Popular Champion." He waved it triumphantly before my father's eyes.
"Pisistratus", said my father, "look here. This is the way your Uncle Jack now prints his pats of butter.—A cap of liberty growing out of an open book! Good! Jack, good! good!"
"It is Jacobinical!" exclaimed the Captain.