same time so impossible for her to accept any one less than a
gentleman. Yet he remembered that to outsiders such fastidiousness
must show in a ridiculous light. What claim to gentility had they,
the Peaks? Was it not all a figment of his own self-conceit? Even in
education Charlotte could barely assert a superiority to Mr. Cusse,
for her formal schooling had ended when she was twelve, and she had
never cared to read beyond the strait track clerical inspiration.

There were other circumstances which helped to depress his estimate
of the family dignity. His brother Oliver, now seventeen, was
developing into a type of young man as objectionable as it is easily
recognised. The slow, compliant boy had grown more flesh and muscle
than once seemed likely, and his wits had begun to display that kind
of vivaciousness which is only compatible with a nature moulded in
common clay. He saw much company, and all of low intellectual order;
he had purchased a bicycle, and regarded it as a source of
distinction, a means of displaying himself before shopkeepers'
daughters; he believed himself a modest tenor, and sang verses of
sentimental imbecility; he took in several weekly papers of
unpromising title, for the chief purpose of deciphering cryptograms,
in which pursuit he had singular success. Add to these
characteristics a penchant for cheap jewellery, and Oliver Peak
stands confessed.

It appeared to Godwin that his brother had leapt in a few months to
these heights of vulgar accomplishment; each separate revelation
struck unexpectedly upon his nerves and severely tried his temper.
When at length Oliver, waiting for supper, began to dance
grotesquely to an air which local talent had somehow caught from the
London music-halls, Godwin's self-control gave way.