length before him, 'we must
not trifle in this matter. We must not deceive each other, or ourselves.
Let me pursue the manly open part I wish to take, and do not repel me by
this unkind indifference.'

'Whether I am indifferent or no,' returned the other, 'I leave you, my
dear boy, to judge. A ride of twenty-five or thirty miles, through miry
roads--a Maypole dinner--a tete-a-tete with Haredale, which, vanity
apart, was quite a Valentine and Orson business--a Maypole bed--a
Maypole landlord, and a Maypole retinue of idiots and centaurs;--whether
the voluntary endurance of these things looks like indifference, dear
Ned, or like the excessive anxiety, and devotion, and all that sort of
thing, of a parent, you shall determine for yourself.'

'I wish you to consider, sir,' said Edward, 'in what a cruel situation I
am placed. Loving Miss Haredale as I do'--

'My dear fellow,' interrupted his father with a compassionate smile,
'you do nothing of the kind. You don't know anything about it. There's
no such thing, I assure you. Now, do take my word for it. You have good
sense, Ned,--great good sense. I wonder you should be guilty of such
amazing absurdities. You really surprise me.'

'I repeat,' said his son firmly, 'that I love her. You have interposed
to part us, and have, to the extent I have just now told you of,
succeeded. May I induce you, sir, in time, to think more favourably of
our attachment, or is it your intention and your fixed design to hold us
asunder if you can?'

'My dear Ned,' returned his father, taking a pinch of snuff and pushing
his box towards him, 'that is my purpose most undoubtedly.'

'The time that has elapsed,' rejoined his son, 'since I began to know
her worth, has flown in such a dream that until now I have hardly once
paused to reflect upon my true position. What is it? From my childhood
I have been accustomed to luxury and idleness, and have been bred as
though my fortune were large, and my expectations almost without a
limit. The idea of wealth has been familiarised to me from my cradle. I
have been taught to look upon those means, by which men raise themselves
to riches and distinction, as being beyond my heeding, and beneath my
care. I have been, as the phrase is, liberally educated, and am fit
for nothing. I find myself at last wholly dependent upon you, with no
resource but in your favour. In this momentous question of my life we do
not, and it would seem we never can, agree. I have shr