the time he's thirty, he shall not choose a wife with ten thousand
pounds down; but I do say, if a boy of mine, with only two hundred a
year--which is all Roger will have from us, and that not for a long
time--goes and marries a woman with fifty thousand to her portion, I
will disown him--it would be just disgusting.'

'Not if they loved each other, and their whole happiness depended upon
their marrying each other?' put in Mrs. Hamley, mildly.

'Pooh! away with love! Nay, my dear, we loved each other so dearly we
should never have been happy with any one else; but that's a different
thing. People are not like what they were when we were young. All the
love now-a-days is just silly fancy, and sentimental romance, as far as
I can see.'

Mr. Gibson thought that he had settled everything about Molly's going
to Hamley before he spoke to her about it, which he did not do, until
the morning of the day on which Mrs. Hamley expected her. Then he
said,--'By the way, Molly! you are to go to Hamley this afternoon; Mrs.
Hamley wants you to go to her for a week or two, and it suits me
capitally that you should accept her invitation just now.'

'Go to Hamley! This afternoon! Papa, you've got some odd reasons at the
back of your head--some mystery, or something. Please, tell me what it
is. Go to Hamley for a week or two! Why, I never was from home before
this without you in all my life.'

'Perhaps not. I don't think you ever walked before you put your feet to
the ground. Everything must have a beginning.'