"What do you want so early?" "Uncle, you are my father's brother--" "To be sure I am, and when I went abroad I left everything to your father. All I now have I earned for myself." "I have not come for money, but to ask you to fulfil the office of a father for me." "How? What?" "Uncle, Annele of the Lion and I love one another. Her mother knows it and sanctions it. Now I am to ask her of her father, according to the custom, and I want you to go with me as my father's brother." "So?" said Petrovitsch, putting a lump of white sugar in his mouth and walking up and down the carpeted room. "So?" he repeated as he faced about. "You will have an energetic wife, and I must say you have good courage. I should not have given you credit for having the courage to take such a wife." "Courage! What do you mean by that?" "No harm; but I would not have believed you had the presumption to take such a wife." "Presumption? What presumption is there in it?" Petrovitsch smiled, and made no answer. "You know her, uncle. She is frugal and orderly and comes of an honest house." "That is not my meaning. It is presumption in you to think that in your solitary house on the Morgenhalde you can make up to a girl who has spent the twenty-two years of her life in an inn for a room full of flattering guests. It is presumption to want to keep to yourself a woman who can manage a whole hotel full. A wise man does not choose a wife who would consume half his life were he to live as she would have him. It is no trifle to govern such a wife. You had better try to manage four wild horses from the coach-box." "I do not want to govern her." "I believe you. But you must either govern or be governed. I will do her the justice to say she is good-natured,--only, however, to those who flatter her or submit to her. She is the sole good one in the house. As for the two old people, they are hypocrites, each in his own way; the woman with much talking, the husband with little. When he speaks he gives it to be understood that every one of his words weighs a pound. You can weigh it if you like. You will find it exact, no atom short. When he puts his foot down to the ground, every step says, 'Here comes a man of honor.' When he takes a fork in his hand, 'So eats a man of honor,' it says. When he looks out of the window, he expects God in heaven to call down to him, 'Good morning, thou man of honor!' And for all that I would bet my head he is in debt for the fork in his hand and the creaking boots on his feet." "I did not come to hear that, uncle." "I suppose not." "I only came to ask you, in all respect, if you would act as my father's representative, and go with me to urge my suit." "I don't know why I should. You are of age. You did not seek my advice beforehand." "Excuse me for having asked you."