ch, met by a deep and hostile undercurrent
of old ideas, become more provocatively billowy and surging.

CHAPTER XII.

THERE had been great festivities at Exmundham, in celebration of the
honour bestowed upon the world by the fact that Kenelm Chillingly had
lived twenty-one years in it.

The young heir had made a speech to the assembled tenants and other
admitted revellers, which had by no means added to the exhilaration of
the proceedings. He spoke with a fluency and self-possession which were
surprising in a youth addressing a multitude for the first time. But his
speech was not cheerful.

The principal tenant on the estate, in proposing his health, had
naturally referred to the long line of his ancestors. His father's
merits as man and landlord had been enthusiastically commemorated; and
many happy auguries for his own future career had been drawn, partly
from the excellences of his parentage, partly from his own youthful
promise in the honours achieved at the University.

Kenelm Chillingly in reply largely availed himself of those new ideas
which were to influence the rising generation, and with which he had
been rendered familiar by the journal of Mr. Mivers and the conversation
of Mr. Welby.

He briefly disposed of the ancestral part of the question. He observed
that it was singular to note how long any given family or, dynasty could
continue to flourish in any given nook of matter in creation, without
any exhibition of intellectual powers beyond those displayed by a
succession of vegetable crops. "It is certainly true," he said, "that
the Chillinglys have lived in this place from father to son for about a
fourth part of the history of the world, since the date which Sir Isaac
Newton assigns to the Deluge. But, so far as can be judged by existent
records, the world has not been in any way wiser or better for their
existence. They were born to eat as long as they could eat, and when
they could eat no longer they died. Not that in this respect they were
a whit less insignificant than the generality of their fellow-creatures.
Most of us now present," continued the youthful orator, "are only born
in order to die; and the chief consolation of our wounded pride in
admitting this fact is in the probability that our posterity will not
be of more consequence to the scheme of Nature than we ourselves are."
Passing from that philosophical view of his own ancestors in particular,
and of the human race in general, K