'
'Now you are poking your fun at me,' said Gerald.
'Well he may,' said the Duke sententiously. 'We have laid
ourselves very open to having fun poked at us in this matter.'
'I think,' said Tregear, 'that they are learning to do the same
sort of thing in American Universities.'
'Oh, indeed,' said the Duke in a solemn, dry, funereal tone. And
then all the little life which Gerald's remark about the boat-race
had produced, was quenched at once. The Duke was not angry with
Tregear for his little word of defence,--but he was not able to
bring himself into harmony with this one guest, and was almost
savage to him without meaning it. He was continually asking
himself why Destiny had been so hard upon him as to force him to
receive there at his table as his son-in-law a man who was
distasteful to him. And he was endeavouring to answer the
question, taking himself to task and telling himself that his
destiny had done him no injury, and that the pride which had been
wounded was a false pride. He was making a brave fight; but during
the fight he was hardly fit to be the genial father and father-in-
law of young people who were going to be married to one another.
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