In the meantime Evan, a lad of seventeen, spent the hours not devoted to his positive profession—­that of gentleman—­in the offices of the brewery, toying with big books and balances, which he despised with the combined zeal of the sucking soldier and emancipated tailor.

Two years passed in attendance on the astute brother-in-law, to whom Fortune now beckoned to come to her and gather his laurels from the pig-tails.  About the same time the Countess sailed over from Lisbon on a visit to her sister Harriet (in reality, it was whispered in the Cogglesby saloons, on a diplomatic mission from the Court of Lisbon; but that could not be made ostensible).  The Countess narrowly examined Evan, whose steady advance in his profession both her sisters praised.

‘Yes,’ said the Countess, in a languid alien accent.  ’He has something of his father’s carriage—­something.  Something of his delivery—­his readiness.’

It was a remarkable thing that these ladies thought no man on earth like their father, and always cited him as the example of a perfect gentleman, and yet they buried him with one mind, and each mounted guard over his sepulchre, to secure his ghost from an airing.

’He can walk, my dears, certainly, and talk—­a little.  Tete-a-tete, I do not say.  I should think there he would be—­a stick!  All you English are.  But what sort of a bow has he got, I ask you?  How does he enter a room?  And, then his smile! his laugh!  He laughs like a horse—­absolutely!  There’s no music in his smile.  Oh! you should see a Portuguese nobleman smile.  O mio Deus! honeyed, my dears!  But Evan has it not.  None of you English have.  You go so.’

The Countess pressed a thumb and finger to the sides of her mouth, and set her sisters laughing.

’I assure you, no better! not a bit!  I faint in your society.  I ask myself—­Where am I?  Among what boors have I fallen?  But Evan is no worse than the rest of you; I acknowledge that.  If he knew how to dress his shoulders properly, and to direct his eyes—­Oh! the eyes! you should see how a Portuguese nobleman can use his eyes!  Soul! my dears, soul!  Can any of you look the unutterable without being absurd!  You look so.’

And the Countess hung her jaw under heavily vacuous orbits, something as a sheep might yawn.

‘But I acknowledge that Evan is no worse than the rest of you,’ she repeated.  ’If he understood at all the management of his eyes and mouth!  But that’s what he cannot possibly learn in England—­not possibly!  As for your poor husband, Harriet! one really has to remember his excellent qualities to forgive him, poor man!  And that stiff bandbox of a man of yours, Caroline!’ addressing the wife of the Marine, ’he looks as if he were all angles and sections, and were taken to pieces every night and put together in the morning.  He may be a good soldier—­good anything you will—­but, Diacho! to be married to that!  He is not civilized.  None of you English are.