This was the view that now absorbed and fixed my mind.  To have him a frequent visitor at Riversley, if not a resident in the house, enlivening them all, while I, perhaps, trifled a cavalry sabre, became one of my settled dreams.  The difficult part of the scheme appeared to me the obtaining of my father’s consent.  I mentioned it, and he said immediately that he must have his freedom.  ‘Now, for instance,’ said he, ’what is my desire at this moment?  I have always a big one perched on a rock in the distance; but I speak of my present desire.  And let it be supposed that the squire is one of us:  we are returning to England.  Well, I want to show you a stork’s nest.  We are not far enough South for the stork to build here.  It is a fact, Richie, that I do want to show you the bird for luck, and as a feature of the country.  And in me, a desire to do a thing partakes of the impetus of steam.

Well, you see we are jogging home to England.  I resist myself for duty’s sake:  that I can do.  But if the squire were here with his yea and his nay, by heavens!  I should be off to the top of the Rhine like a tornado.  I submit to circumstances:  I cannot, and I will not, be dictated to by men.’

‘That seems to me rather unreasonable,’ I remonstrated.

‘It is; I am ashamed of it,’ he answered.  ’Do as you will, Richie; set me down at Riversley, but under no slight, mark you.  I keep my honour intact, like a bottled cordial; my unfailing comfort in adversity!  I hand it to you, my son, on my death-bed, and say, “You have there the essence of my life.  Never has it been known of me that I swallowed an insult."’

‘Then, papa, I shall have a talk with the squire.’

‘Make good your ground in the castle,’ said he.  ’I string a guitar outside.  You toss me a key from the walls.  If there is room, and I have leisure, I enter.  If not, you know I am paving your way in other quarters.  Riversley, my boy, is an excellent foothold and fortress:  Riversley is not the world.  At Riversley I should have to wear a double face, and, egad! a double stomach-bag, like young Jack feeding with the giant—­one full of ambition, the other of provender.  That place is our touchstone to discover whether we have prudence.  We have, I hope.  And we will have, Mr. Temple, a pleasant day or two in Paris.’

It was his habit to turn off the bent of these conversations by drawing Temple into them.  Temple declared there was no feeling we were in a foreign country while he was our companion.  We simply enjoyed strange scenes, looking idly out of our windows.  Our recollection of the strangest scene ever witnessed filled us with I know not what scornful pleasure, and laughed in the background at any sight or marvel pretending to amuse us.  Temple and I cantered over the great Belgian battlefield, talking of Bella Vista tower, the statue, the margravine, our sour milk and black-bread breakfast, the little Princess Ottilia, with her ’It is my question,’ and ‘You were kind to my lambs, sir,’ thoughtless of glory and dead bones.  My father was very differently impressed.  He was in an exultant glow, far outmatching the bloom on our faces when we rejoined him.  I cried,