A prouder-hearted man I never met, or one less willing to share his sorrows with his friends."
"I have often heard him speak of you," said Mark.
"One of the bitterest feelings I have is that a man so dear to me should live so near to me, and that I should see so little of him. But what can I do? He will not come to my house; and when I go to his, he is angry with me because I wear a shovel hat and ride on horseback."
"I should leave my hat and my horse at the borders of the last parish," said Lucy, timidly.
"Well—yes, certainly; one ought not to give offense even in such matters as that; but my coat and waistcoat would then be equally objectionable. I have changed—in outward matters I mean, and he has not. That irritates him; and, unless I could be what I was in the old days, he will not look at me with the same eyes;" and then he rode on, in order, as he said, that the first pang of the interview might be over before Robarts and his sister came upon the scene.
Mr. Crawley was standing before his door, leaning over the little wooden railing, when the dean trotted up on his horse. He had come out, after hours of close watching, to get a few mouthfuls of the sweet summer air, and as he stood there he held the youngest of his children in his arms. The poor little baby sat there, quiet indeed, but hardly happy. This father, though he loved his offspring with an affection as intense as that which human nature can supply, was not gifted with the knack of making children fond of him; for it is hardly more than a knack, that aptitude which some men have of gaining the good graces of the young. Such men are not always the best fathers or the safest guardians; but they carry about with them a certain duc ad me which children recognize, and which in three minutes upsets all the barriers between five and five-and-forty. But Mr. Crawley was a stern man, thinking ever of the souls and minds of his bairns—as a father should do; and thinking also that every season was fitted for operating on these souls and minds—as, perhaps, he should not have done either as a father or as a teacher; and consequently his children avoided him when the choice was given them, thereby adding fresh wounds to his torn heart, but by no means quenching any of the great love with which he regarded them.
