That evening’s report of the demeanour of the young Irish secretary in harness was not so exhilarating as John Mattock had expected, and he inclined to think his sister guilty of casting her protecting veil over the youth.  It appeared that Mr. O’Donnell had been studious of his duties, had spoken upon no other topic, had asked pertinent questions, shown no flippancy, indulged in no extravagances.  He seemed, Jane said, eager to master details.  A certain eagerness of her own in speaking of it sharpened her clear features as if they were cutting through derision.  She stated it to propitiate her brother, as it might have done but for the veracious picture of Patrick in the word ‘eager,’ which pricked the scepticism of a practical man.  He locked his mouth, looking at her with a twinkle she refused to notice.  ‘Determined to master details’ he could have accepted.  One may be determined to find a needle in a dust-heap; one does not with any stiffness of purpose go at a dust-heap eagerly.  Hungry men have eaten husks; they have not betrayed eagerness for such dry stuff.  Patrick’s voracity after details exhibited a doubtfully genuine appetite, and John deferred his amusement until the termination of the week or month when his dear good Jane would visit the office to behold a vacated seat, or be assailed by the customary proposal.  Irishmen were not likely to be far behind curates in besieging an heiress.  For that matter, Jane was her own mistress and could very well take care of herself; he had confidence in her wisdom.

He was besides of an unsuspicious and an unexacting temperament.  The things he would strongly object to he did not specify to himself because he was untroubled by any forethought of them.  Business, political, commercial and marine, left few vacancies in his mind other than for the pleasures he could command and enjoy.  He surveyed his England with a ruddy countenance, and saw the country in the reflection.  His England saw much of itself in him.  Behind each there was more, behind the country a great deal more, than could be displayed by a glass.  The salient features wore a resemblance.  Prosperity and heartiness; a ready hand on, and over, a full purse; a recognised ability of the second-rate order; a stout hold of patent principles; inherited and embraced, to make the day secure and supply a somniferous pillow for the night; occasional fits of anxiety about affairs, followed by an illuminating conviction that the world is a changing one and our construction not of granite, nevertheless that a justifiable faith in the ship, joined to a constant study of the chart, will pull us through, as it has done before, despite all assaults and underminings of the common enemy and the particular; these, with the humorous indifference of familiarity and constitutional annoyances, excepting when they grew acute and called for drugs, and with friendliness to the race of man of both colours, in the belief that our Creator originally composed in black and white, together with a liking for matters on their present footing in slow motion, partly under his conductorship, were the prominent characteristics of the grandson of the founder of the house, who had built it from a spade.