The Foundling Read Online Free PDF

a want of spirits in you, you have never caused me anxiety."
    The Duke, feeling that a response was expected, stammered: "Th-thank you, sir!"
    "I don't say that you are as wise as I could wish," said Lord Lionel, tempering his praise, "or that you have not a great many faults, but on the whole I fancy your poor father might have been not dissatisfied with his son, had he lived to see you today." Here he took another pinch of snuff. As Gilly was unable to think of anything to say, an uneasy silence prevailed. Lord Lionel broke it. "Your father left you to my guardianship," he said, "and I think I may say that I have in every way open to me followed out what I knew to be his wishes. I even had you christened Adolphus," he added, a slight sense of grievance overcoming him, "although it is one of these new-fangled German names that I very much dislike. However, that was a small thing, and you know I have never called you by it. And I have never permitted your uncle Henry to interfere in your education, for all he has been one of your trustees. I have nothing to say against your uncle, and no doubt his notions do very well for his own sons, but they will not do for me, and they would not have done for your father either, and a thousand pities it was that his name should have been included in the Trust. But there is no sense in repining over that, and I hope I know how to deal with my own brother."
    The Duke, drawing upon his recollection, could not feel that this hope was misplaced, but he did not think himself called upon to say so. Instead he uttered an indistinguishable murmur.
    "There is no reason why you should be treated like a child, Gilly," said Lord Lionel, in a burst of candour, "so I shall not conceal from you that I have a very poor opinion of your uncle's judgment! He does not want, precisely, for sense, but you must know that he never partook of your father's and my sentiments as one could have wished he might have done, and when he married that foolish woman—but I do not wish to dwell upon that, and if he chose to ally himself with a female out of a canting Methodist family, and to breed a pack of ill-conditioned brats who can think of nothing better to do than to ruin a lawn it has taken fifty years to bring to perfection, I am sure it was not for me to cavil. Although, mind you," he added admonishingly, "I told him how it would be at the outset. But Henry was never one to listen to those who might be supposed to be a little wiser than himself. I trust you will not turn out to be the same, Gilly."
    The Duke assured him that he would not.
    "No, well, I fancy I have drilled a few proper notions into your head," agreed his uncle. "But all this has nothing to do with what I have to say to you!" He bent his austere gaze upon Gilly's downcast face, and was silent for a moment. "I am speaking of your marriage, Gilly," he said abruptly.
    The Duke looked up, startled. "My marriage, sir!"
    "There is nothing to be surprised about in that, surely!" said Lord Lionel. "It is not, I fancy, unknown to you that I have already made certain arrangements on your behalf. I do not believe in making a secret of a very ordinary business, and since I am quite as much concerned with the question of your future comfort and happiness as with the very important one of securing the succession, I have been careful to choose for you a bride who will bring you, besides the necessary advantages of birth and fortune, a reasonable chance of harmony in your future life. In this, I hope you will realize, my boy, that I have had all these modern notions with which I make no doubt you are imbued in my head. You are not to suppose that my mind was irrevocably fixed upon the first and most obvious choice. I have had several young females in my eye, but I believe they will not do for you, and it is now some years since I have entertained any other idea than that you should, as soon as you had come of full age, marry Lady Harriet Presteigne."
    The Duke got