At first he was quite wild with rage, and would have fought the
whole county, man by man, if they would have met him. But he had since
changed his habits and, as he says, his aspirations altogether.'
'He has become religious.'
'The only occupation remaining to him. He owes money; he is poor; he is
isolated; and he says, sick and religious. Your poor father, who was
very decided and inflexible, never helped him beyond the limit he had
prescribed, after Silas's _mesalliance_. He wanted to get him into
Parliament, and would have paid his expenses, and made him an allowance;
but either Silas had grown lazy, or he understood his position better than
poor Austin, or he distrusted his powers, or possibly he really is in
ill-health; but he objected his religious scruples. Your poor papa thought
self-assertion possible, where an injured man has right to rely upon, but
he had been very long out of the world, and the theory won't do. Nothing is
harder than to get a person who has once been effectually slurred, received
again. Silas, I think, was right. I don't think it was practicable.
'Dear child, how late it is!' exclaimed Lady Knollys suddenly, looking at
the Louis Quatorze clock, that crowned the mantelpiece.
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