talks German one _must_ shout,' said Herr Heinrich. 'It is taught so in
the schools.' And it is. They teach them to shout and to throw out their
chests. Just as they teach them to read notice-boards and not think
about politics. Their very ribs are not their own. My Herr Heinrich is
comparatively a liberal thinker. He asked me the other day, 'But why
should I give myself up to philology? But then,' he reflected, 'it is
what I have to do.'"

Mr. Britling seemed to have finished, and then just as Mr. Direck was
planning a way of getting the talk back by way of Teddy to Miss Corner,
he snuggled more deeply into his chair, reflected and broke out again.

"This contrast between Heinrich's carefulness and Teddy's
easy-goingness, come to look at it, is I suppose one of the most
fundamental in the world. It reaches to everything. It mixes up with
education, statecraft, morals. Will you make or will you take? Those are
the two extreme courses in all such things. I suppose the answer of
wisdom to that is, like all wise answers, a compromise. I suppose one
must accept and then make all one can of it.... Have you talked at all
to my eldest son?"

"He's a very interesting young man indeed," said Mr. Direck. "I should
venture to say there's a very great deal in him. I was most impressed by
the few words I had with him."

"There, for example, is one of my perplexities," said Mr. Britling.

Mr. Direck waited for some further light on this sudden transition.

"Ah! your troubles in life haven't begun yet. Wait till you're a father.