Lady Middleton vindicated the practice he had condemned, declaring that no persons of the least fashion or refinement could bear to have an English animal about them when once they had been accustomed to a foreigner, and concluding with a warm eulogy of Dupin, as one of the honestest, cleverest, and best, servants that ever came into a house. "My dear Gale!" said the sister, following up the mother's argument, "where can you have possibly picked up such antiquated notions? Do you not find in every house of distinction either a Frenchman or a Swiss, as chef de cuisine, maître d'hôtel, or in some other capacity; and can you possibly deny that they are a thousand times more clever and polished than our horrid English creatures? Oh, the heavyhanded and heavy-headed bunglers! How can you compare them with our dear, quickwitted, and fairy-footed Dupin, who seems to be everywhere at once." "Ay, and what's the upshot?" asked the father; "find him nowhere when you want him. Had him there tho'! Hick, hick, hey!" Sir Matthew then proceeded to enforce his former objections, and his lady as vigorously defended her own positions, her smile becoming more bland, and her language more coldly courteous, as she felt her ground to be untenable, until at length, in order to terminate a discussion in which she was losing ground as well as patience, she arose, and retired with her daughter to the drawing-room, bowing as she departed with an expression of peculiar complacency. When the ladies had quitted the apartment, Sir Matthew, drawing round his chair to the fire, and desiring his son to do the same, poured out a couple of bumpers, and, after swallowing the contents of his own glass, and refilling it, exclaimed-" No good to be done with an empty glass, or an empty stomach; ex nihil nihil fit: nothink can come of nothink there, you dog! See, I understand Latin, though they tell me I can't speak English. Fudge! Gale, my dear boy! glad the women are gone, for I want to have a long chat with 'ee, and haven't had an opportunity since 'ee came back from Sussex. Why, lad, thee seemest more in the dumps and doldrums nail, hey ?" "No indeed, Sir; I was as grave as I am now before ever I knew Miss Norberry. If I am not so cheerful as you could wish, I am sorry for it especially as I fear my dejection must be a constitutional defect, since I cannot assign any particular cause for it." "Tell 'ee what, boy. Think it's all owing to your grubbing so much in your study, and poking and poring over those plaguy books. Wouldn't mind if they were journal and ledger, cash-book and day-book. Some sense in them; giv'ee salt to your porridge; but as to your poets and philosophers, your Shakspeare and Milton, and Beaumont and Fletcher, and Boulton and Watt, and the devil knows what, wouldn't give five pounds for the whole kit. Can't eat 'em, nor drink 'em, nor make a jacket of 'em, nor pay bills with 'em; then, what are they good for, hey?" It was a peculiarity in the character of Gale Middleton, who, from his long habit of thinking aloud, was almost unconscious of his soliloquies, that when his feelings were aroused, he would occasionally burst into some rapturous effusion in the presence of auditors who, so far from sympathising with his enthusiasm, were even unable to comprehend, or even to account for it, except by whispering to themselves, or to one another, the significant words, "Crazy Middleton." "What are they good for?" echoed the youth-his pale cheek kindling, and his eye flashing with animation. "O my books, my dear, my precious books! my delights, my guides, my chosen friends and companions, the miracle and magic of my life! Ye are to me as guardian angels, bright-eyed, peace-breathing, seraph-winged, and happy-hearted, who waft around me with your pinions the tranquil airs of heaven, and reconcile me to this melancholy world by abstracting me for a time from the contemplation of its miseries !" "Whew!" whistled the Baronet, setting down his glass, and staring at his son-"What's the matter? got a fit? struck comical, hope 'ee dont bite. But that's always your way. Either as glum and grave as a bankrupt at Guildhall, or else away you go like a rocket, up into the clouds, whizz! fizz! crack! Can't speak plain sense and good English as I do?" "You asked me, Sir," said the son, in a more composed tone, "what books were good for; and I would enquire of you in return, whether you have ever considered the mysterious, I had almost said the divine, nature of a book?" "Not I knew something about the cashbook, and the waste-book, and the bill-book, and the pay-book. Made my fortune by that sort o' library. What will 'ee ever make by yours? Had 'ee there, Gale, hey, hick!" "Have you ever reflected, Sir, that thought, which a French materialist has defined to be an invisible secretion of the brain; thought, which |