"What a charming wife Lucia would make for a man to whom gentleness and a
yielding disposition were necessary! We do not find such girls in society
nowadays, my dear Lady Theobald. It is very difficult of late years to
find a girl who is not spoken of as 'fast,' and who is not disposed to
take the reins in her own hands. Our young men are flattered and courted
until they become a little dictatorial, and our girls are spoiled at
home. And the result is a great deal of domestic unhappiness
afterward--and even a great deal of scandal, which is dreadful to
contemplate. I cannot help feeling the greatest anxiety in secret
concerning Francis. Young men so seldom consider these matters until it
is too late."

"Girls are not trained as they were in my young days, or even in yours,"
said Lady Theobald. "They are allowed too much liberty. Lucia has been
brought up immediately under my own eye."

"I feel that it is fortunate," remarked Mrs. Barold, quite incidentally,
"that Francis need not make a point of money."

For a few moments Lady Theobald did not respond; but afterward, in the
course of the conversation which followed, she made an observation which
was, of course, purely incidental.

"If Lucia makes a marriage which pleases her great-uncle, old Mr. Dugald
Binnie, of Glasgow, she will be a very fortunate girl. He has intimated,
in his eccentric fashion, that his immense fortune will either be hers,
or will be spent in building charitable asylums of various kinds. He is a
remarkable and singular man."

When Capt. Barold had entered his distinguished relative's drawing-room,