‘There is a slight difference; that is certain. And I know full well, any man who wishes to live in decent comfort with me as a husband must be able to control me.’

‘I wish you had a real tyrant.’

‘A tyrant would not hold me for a day—not for an hour. I would rebel—break from him—defy him.’

‘Are you not enough to bewilder one’s brain with your self-contradiction?’

‘It is evident I bewilder your brain.’

‘You talk of Sir Philip being young: he is two-and-twenty.’

‘My husband must be thirty, with the sense of forty.’

‘You had better pick out some old man—some white-headed or bald-headed swain.’

‘No, thank you.’

‘You could lead some doting fool: you might pin him to your apron.’

‘I might do that with a boy: but it is not my vocation. Did I not say I prefer a master? One in whose presence I shall feel obliged and disposed to be good. One whose control my impatient temper must acknowledge. A man whose approbation can reward—whose displeasure punish me. A man I shall feel it impossible not to love, and very possible to fear.’

‘What is there to hinder you from doing all this with Sir Philip? He is a baronet; a man of rank, property, connections, far above yours. If you talk of intellect, he is a poet: he writes verses: which you, I take it, cannot do, with all your cleverness.’

‘Neither his title, wealth, pedigree, nor poetry, avail to invest him with the power I describe. These are featherweights; they want ballast: a measure of sound, solid practical sense would have stood him in better stead with me.’

‘You and Henry rave about poetry! You used to catch fire like tinder on the subject when you were a girl.’

‘Oh, uncle, there is nothing really valuable in this world, there is nothing glorious in the world to come, that is not poetry!’

‘Marry a poet, then, in God’s name!’

‘Show him me, and I will.’

‘Sir Philip.’

‘Not at all. You are almost as good a poet as he.’

‘Madam, you are wandering from the point.’

‘Indeed, uncle, I wanted to do so; and I shall be glad to lead you away with me. Do not let us get out of temper with each other!—it is not worth while.’

‘Out of temper, Miss Keeldar! I should be glad to know who is out of temper?’

‘I am not, yet.’