ic heredity, to know all
one can about one's ancestors, and one's county, and one's collateral
relatives."

"Well, there ARE some Ingledews just now at Wanborough," the General
answered, with some natural hesitation, surveying the tall, handsome
young man from head to foot, not without a faint touch of soldierly
approbation; "but they can hardly be your relatives, however remote....
They're people in a most humble sphere of life. Unless, indeed--well,
we know the vicissitudes of families--perhaps your ancestors and the
Ingledews that I know drifted apart a long time ago."

"Is he a cobbler?" Bertram inquired, without a trace of mauvaise honte.

The General nodded. "Well, yes," he said politely, "that's exactly what
he is; though, as you seemed to be asking about presumed relations, I
didn't like to mention it."

"Oh, then, he's my ancestor," Bertram put in, quite pleased at the
discovery. "That is to say," he added after a curious pause, "my
ancestor's descendant. Almost all my people, a little way back, you see,
were shoe-makers or cobblers."

He said it with dignity, exactly as he might have said they were dukes
or lord chancellors; but Philip could not help pitying him, not so much
for being descended from so mean a lot, as for being fool enough to
acknowledge it on a gentleman's lawn at Brackenhurst. Why, with manners
like his, if he had not given himself away, one might easily have taken
him for a descendant of the Plantagenets.

So the General seemed to think too, for he added quickly, "But you're
very like the duke, and the duke's a Bertram. Is he also a relative?"

The young man coloured slightly. "Ye-es," he answered, hesitating; "but
we're not very proud of the Bertram connection. They never did much
good in the world, the Bertrams. I bear the name, one may almost say by
accident, because it was handed down to me by my grandfather Ingledew,
who had Bertram blood, but was a vast deal a better man than any other
member of the Bertram family."

"I'll be seeing the duke on Wednesday," the General put in, with marked
politeness, "and I'll ask him, if you like, about your grandfather's
relationship. Who was he exactly, and what was his connection with the
present man or his predecessor?"

"Oh, don't, please," Bertram put in, half-pleadingly, it is true, but
still with that same ineffable and indefinable air of a great gentleman
that never for a moment deserted him. "The duke would never have heard
of my a