'I am afraid,' said Mrs. Vereker, 'that both were left. But fancy a woman who was also a logician! For my part, I consider it a great privilege to be as unreasonable as I choose.' 'The arguments of beauty,' said the General, 'are always irresistible; but I am quite for female education.' 'And I,' said Mrs. Vereker, 'am dead against it. We know quite as much as is good for us as it is. What do you say, Maud?' 'I have quite forgotten all I learnt at school already,' said Maud. 'General Beau, can you say your Duty to your Neighbour?' 'And your duty to your neighbour's wife?' put in Desvoeux. 'But I object to all education as revolutionary--part of this horrid radical epoch it which we live.' 'Yes,' said Mrs. Vereker, 'one of the nice things about India is its being a military despotism. As for Europe, the mobs have it all their own way.' 'Horrid mobs!' said Desvoeux, 'as if an unwashed rabble was Nature's last achievement. Her 'prentice hand she tried on lords, And then she made the masses O!' 'But you must teach them religion, you know,' said the General, 'the Catechism, and so forth.' 'Of course,' said Maud; their Duty to their Neighbour, for instance.' 'I don't know,' said Mrs. Vereker; 'they only learn it all by rote. When I was last in England our clergyman gave us this specimen of one of his parishioners, to whom he had been detailing the mysteries of faith: '"_Clergyman._ And now, Sally, how do you expect to be saved?"' '"_Sally._ Dun'noa; please, sir, tell I."' 'Well,' said Desvoeux, 'theology is a thing I never could understand myself. Now I must be off to my Agent.' 'When shall we see you again?' said Maud. 'Dun'noa,' said Desvoeux; 'please, ma'am, tell I. What time shall I come and take you out this afternoon?' But the ladies had visitors more distinguished even than the General. The Agent himself came in one Sunday after church and asked to be allowed to stay to lunch. Cards flowed in apace from Government House, for the Master of the Ceremonies there knew that no entertainment would be complete where Maud was not.