"That is enough, reverend Sir," I said, "for surely it is scarcely
needful to talk of children to people who have not been married five
minutes."

That pricked the bladder of his discourse, which soon came to an end,
whereon I called to the Kaffirs to bring in dinner.

The food was good and plentiful, and so was the Hollands, or Squareface
as they call it now, to say nothing of the Constantia and peach-brandy
which had been sent to me many years before by a cousin who lived at
Stellenbosch; and yet that meal was not as cheerful as it might have
been. To begin with, the _predicant_ was sulky because I had cut him
short in his address, and a holy man in the sulks is a bad kind of
animal to deal with. Then Jan tried to propose the health of the new
married pair and could not do it. The words seemed to stick in his
throat, for at the best Jan was never a speaker. In short, he made a
fool of himself as usual, and I had to fill up the gaps in his head.

Well, I talked nicely enough till in an evil moment I overdid it a
little by speaking of Ralph as one whom Heaven had sent to us, and of
whose birth and parents we knew nothing. Then Jan found his tongue
and said: "Wife, that's a lie, and you know it," for, doubtless, the
Hollands and the peach-brandy had got the better of his reason and
his manners. I did not answer him at the time, for I hate wrangling in
public, but afterwards I spoke to him on the subject once and for all.
Luckily, the _predicant_ took no notice of this incident, for he was
thinking about himself as he was too prone to do.

Then, to make matters worse, Suzanne must needs throw her arms round her