"No excuses! we must have your opinion."
"If it must be so," replied the father, "I should humbly think there was no necessity for challenges, nor bearers, nor blows."
The guests looked in wonder at each other. "Oh! how ridiculous!" said the Count Attilio. "Pardon me, father; but this is exceedingly ridiculous. It is plain you know nothing of the world."
"He?" said Don Roderick; "he knows as much of it as you do, cousin. Is it not so, father?"
Father Christopher made no reply; but to himself he said, "submit thyself to every insult for the sake of those for whom thou art here."
"It may be so," said the count; "but the fatherhow is the father called?"
"Father Christopher," replied more than one.
"But, Father Christopher, your reverend worship, with your maxims you would turn the world upside down—without challenges! without blows! Farewell, the point of honour! Impunity to ruffians! Happily, the thing is impossible."
"Stop, doctor," cried Don Roderick, wishing to divert the dispute from the original antagonists. "You are a good man for an argument; what have you to say to the father?"
"Indeed," replied the doctor, brandishing his fork in the air—"indeed I cannot understand how the Father Christopher should not remember that his judgment, though of just weight in the pulpit, is worth nothing—I speak with great submission—on a question of knighthood. But perhaps he has been merely jesting, to relieve himself from embarrassment."
The father not replying to this, Don Roderick made an effort to change the subject.
"Apropos," said he, "I understand there is a report at Milan of an accommodation."
There was at this time a contest regarding the succession to the dukedom of Mantua, of which, at the death of Vincenzo Gonzasa, who died without male issue, the Duke de Nevers, his nearest relation, had obtained possession.
