a mistake.  In marriage—­and remember this, Piers, for your time’ll come—­it must be the best, or none at all.  I acted upon that, though Heaven knows the trials and temptations I went through.  I said to myself—­ the best or none!  And I found her, Piers; I found her sitting at a cottage door by Enniscorthy, County Wexford, where for a time I had the honour of acting as tutor to a young gentleman of promise, cut short, alas!—­’the blind Fury with the abhorred shears!’ I wrote an elegy on him, which I’ll show you.  His father admired it, had it printed, and gave me twenty pounds, like the gentleman he was!”

There appeared a handsome tea-service; the only objection to it being that every piece was chipped or cracked, and not one thoroughly clean.  Leonora, a well-behaved little creature who gave earnest of a striking face, sat on her mother’s lap, watching the visitor and plainly afraid of him.

“Well,” exclaimed Mrs. Otway, “I should never have taken you two for brothers—­no, not even the half of it!”

“He has an intellectual face, Biddy,” observed her husband.  “Pale just now, but it’s ‘the pale cast of thought.’  What are you aiming at, Piers?”

“I don’t know,” was the reply, absently spoken.

“Ah, but I’m sorry to hear that.  You should have concentrated yourself by now, indeed you should.  If I had to begin over again, I should go in for commerce.”

Piers gave him a look of interest.

“Indeed?  You mean that?”

“I do.  I would apply myself to the science and art of money-making in the only hopeful way—­honest buying and selling.  There’s something so satisfying about it.  I envy even the little shopkeeper, who reckons up his profits every Saturday night, and sees his business growing.  But you must begin early; you must learn money-making like anything else.  If I had made money, Piers, I should be at this moment the most virtuous and meritorious citizen of the British Empire!”

Alexander was vexed to find that his brother did not smoke.  He lit his pipe after tea, and for a couple of hours talked ceaselessly, relating the course of his adventurous life; an entertaining story, told with abundant vigour, with humorous originality.  Though he had in his possession scarce a dozen volumes, Alexander was really a bookish man and something of a scholar; his quotations, which were frequent, ranged from Homer to Horace, from Chaucer to Tennyson.  He recited a few of his own poetical compositions, and they might have been worse; Piers made him glow and sparkle with a little praise.

Meanwhile, Bridget was putting the children to bed and cooking the evening meal—­styled dinner for this occasion.  Both proceedings were rather tumultuous, but, amid the clamour they necessitated, no word of ill-temper could be heard; screams of laughter, on the other hand, were frequent.  With manifest pride the little servant came in to lay the table; she only broke one glass in the operation, and her