First of all there was that bad Tressilian blood--notoriously bad, and
never more flagrantly displayed than in the case of the late Ralph
Tressilian. It wasimpossible that Oliver should have escaped the taint
of it; nor could Sir John perceive any signs that he had done so. He
displayed the traditional Tressilian turbulence. He was passionate and
brutal, and the pirate's trade to which he had now set his hand was of
all trades the one for which he was by nature best equipped. He was
harsh and overbearing, impatient of correction and prone to trample
other men's feelings underfoot. Was this, he asked himself in all
honesty, a mate for Rosamund? Could he entrust her happiness to the
care of such a man? Assuredly he could not.

Therefore, being whole again, he went to remonstrate with her as he
accounted it his duty and as Master Peter had besought him. Yet knowing
the bias that had been his he was careful to understate rather than to
overstate his reasons.

"But, Sir John," she protested, "if every man is to be condemned for the
sins of his forbears, but few could escape condemnation, and wherever
shall you find me a husband deserving your approval?"

"His father...." began Sir John.

"Tell me not of his father, but of himself" she interrupted.

He frowned impatiently--they were sitting in that bower of hers above
the river.

"I was coming to 't," he answered, a thought testily, for these
interruptions which made him keep to the point robbed him of his best