Such a chance had, before now, been looked
back upon as the one bright spot in a long evening's experience.
Dorothea loved all schoolboys for the kindness shown to her by these
few.
She went back to her seat, hard by a group to which Endymion was
discoursing at large. Endymion's was a mellow voice, of rich compass,
and he had a knack of compelling the attention of all persons within
range. He preferred this to addressing anyone in particular, and his
eye sought and found, and gathered by instinct, the last loiterer
without the charmed circle.
"Yes," he was saying, "it is tasteful, and something more. It
illustrates, as you well say, the better side of our excitable
neighbours across the Channel. Setting patriotism apart and regarding
the question merely in its--ah--philosophical aspect, it has often
occurred to me to wonder how a nation so expert in the arts of life,
so--how shall I put it?--"
"Natty," suggested one of his hearers; but he waved the word aside.
"--of such lightness of touch, as I might describe it,--I say, it has
often occurred to me to wonder how such a nation could so far mistake
its destiny and the designs of Providence (inscrutable though they be)
as to embark on a career of foreign conquest which can only--ah--
have one end."
"Come to grief," put in Lady Bateson, a dowager in a crimson cap with
military feathers. She was supposed to cherish a hopeless passion for
Endymion.
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