taking to fisticuffs, their swords would have been out, and as my
boy has, for the last four years, been exercised daily in the use
of his weapon, it might happen that, instead of Alured coming home
with a black eye, and, as you say, a missing tooth, he might have
been carried home with a sword thrust through his body.

"It was, to my mind, entirely the fault of your son. I should have
blamed Charlie, had he called the king at Westminster Dutch
William, for, although each man has a right to his own opinions, he
has no right to offend those of others--besides, at present it is
as well to keep a quiet tongue as to a matter that words cannot set
right. In the same way, your son had no right to offend others by
calling James Stuart the Pretender.

"Certainly, of the twelve boys who go over to learn what the Rector
of Apsley can teach them, more than half are sons of gentlemen
whose opinions are similar to my own.

"It would be much better, John Dormay, if, instead of complaining
of my boy, you were to look somewhat to your own. I marked, the
last time he came over here, that he was growing loutish in his
manners, and that he bore himself with less respect to his elders
than is seemly in a lad of that age. He needs curbing, and would
carry himself all the better if, like Charlie, he had an hour a day
at sword exercise. I speak for the boy's good. It is true that you
yourself, being a bitter Whig, mix but little with your neighbours,
who are for the most part the other way of thinking; but this may
not go on for ever, and you would, I suppose, like Alured, when he
grows up, to mix with others of his rank in the county; and it
would be well, therefore, that he should have the accomplishments