family living in a place, you really CANNOT be too particular what
companions you pick up there, were it even in the most informal and
momentary fashion. Besides, the fellow might turn out to be one of
your social superiors, and not care to know you; in which case, of
course, you would only be letting yourself in for a needless
snubbing. In fact, in this modern England of ours, this fatherland
of snobdom, one passes one's life in a see-saw of doubt, between
the Scylla and Charybdis of those two antithetical social dangers.
You are always afraid you may get to know somebody you yourself do
not want to know, or may try to know somebody who does not want to
know you.

Guided by these truly British principles of ancestral wisdom,
Philip Christy would probably never have seen anything more of the
distinguished-looking stranger had it not been for a passing
accident of muscular action, over which his control was distinctly
precarious. He happened in brushing past to catch the stranger's
eye. It was a clear blue eye, very deep and truthful. It somehow
succeeded in riveting for a second Philip's attention. And it was
plain the stranger was less afraid of speaking than Philip himself
was. For he advanced with a pleasant smile on his open countenance,
and waved one gloveless hand in a sort of impalpable or half-
checked salute, which impressed his new acquaintance as a vaguely
polite Continental gesture. This affected Philip favourably: the
newcomer was a somebody then, and knew his place: for just in
proportion as Philip felt afraid to begin conversation himself with
an unplaced stranger, did he respect any other man who felt so
perfectly sure of his own position that he shared no such middle-
class doubts or misgivings. A duke is never afraid of accosting
anybody. Philip was strengthened, therefore, in his first idea,