.

"No, my dear," he said, handing sixpence to a sweeper; "feelings are
snakes! only fit to be kept in bottles with tight corks. You won't come
to my club? Well, good-bye, old boy; my love to your mother when you
see her"; and turning up the Square, he left Shelton to go on to his
own club, feeling that he had parted, not from his uncle, but from the
nation of which they were both members by birth and blood and education.

CHAPTER VII

THE CLUB

He went into the library of his club, and took up Burke's Peerage.
The words his uncle had said to him on hearing his engagement had been
these: "Dennant! Are those the Holm Oaks Dennants? She was a Penguin."

No one who knew Mr. Paramor connected him with snobbery, but there had
been an "Ah! that 's right; this is due to us" tone about the saying.

Shelton hunted for the name of Baltimore: "Charles Penguin, fifth Baron
Baltimore. Issue: Alice, b. 184-, m. 186-Algernon Dennant, Esq., of Holm
Oaks, Cross Eaton, Oxfordshire." He put down the Peerage and took up
the 'Landed Gentry': "Dennant, Algernon Cuffe, eldest son of the late
Algernon Cuffe Dennant, Esq., J. P., and Irene, 2nd daur. of the Honble.
Philip and Lady Lillian March Mallow; ed. Eton and Ch. Ch., Oxford,
J. P. for Oxfordshire. Residence, Holm Oaks," etc., etc. Dropping the
'Landed Gentry', he took up a volume of the 'Arabian Nights', which some
member had left reposing on the book-rest of his chair, but instead of
reading he kept looking round the room. In almost every seat, reading
or snoozing, were gentlemen who, in their own estimation, might have
married Penguins. For the first time it struck him with what majestic
leisureliness they turned the pages of their books, trifled with their
teacups, or lightly snored. Yet no two were alike--a tall man-with
dark moustache, thick hair, and red, smooth cheeks; another, bald, with
stooping shoulders; a tremendous old buck, with a grey, pointed beard
and large white waistcoat; a clean-shaven dapper man past middle
age, whose face was like a bird's; a long, sallow, misanthrope; and a
sanguine creature fast asleep. Asleep or awake, reading or snoring, fat
or thin, hairy or bald, the insulation of their red or pale faces was
complete. They were all the creatures of good form. Staring at them or
reading the Arabian Nights Shelton spent the time before dinner. He
had not been long seated in the dining-room when a distant connection
strolled up and took the next table