her more kindly. And then as to the property; you must own it would be
a good arrangement. You'd like to know it would go to your own child
and your own grandchild wouldn't you, sir? And I'm not badly off,
without looking to this place at all, and could give her every thing
she wants. But then I don't know that she'd care to marry a farmer.'
These last words he said in a melancholy tone, as though aware that he
was confessing his own disgrace.

The squire had listened to it all, and had not as yet said a word. And
now, when Belton ceased, he did not know what word to speak. He was a
man whose thoughts about women were chivalrous, and perhaps a little
old-fashioned. Of course, when a man contemplates marriage, he could do
nothing better, nothing more honourable, than consult the lady's father
in the first instance. But he felt that even a father should be
addressed on such a subject with great delicacy. There should be
ambages in such a matter. The man who resolved to commit himself to
such a task should come forward with apparent difficulty with great
diffidence, and even with actual difficulty. He should keep himself
almost hidden, as behind a mask, and should tell of his own ambition
with doubtful, quivering voice. And the ambages should take time. He
should approach the citadel to be taken with covered ways working his
way slowly and painfully. But this young man, before he had been in the
house three days, said all that he had to say without the slightest
quaver in his voice, and evidently expected to get an answer about the
squire's daughter as quickly as he had got it about the squire's land.

'You have surprised me very much,' said the old man at last, drawing
his breath.

'I'm quite in earnest about it. Clara seems to me to be the very girl