’She is rustic and good-hearted. But she does not think. She has no knowledge of books. She could be made passable if sent to school, but must be recreated to be given ideas. Besides, I am not fond of the plump and the _ingénue_.’ ’You have not asked after Mr. Battishill. If it be not too great an effort for your memory, you will recall that he had a stroke before you left West Wyke.’ ’Do not be sarcastic. I remember that perfectly well. If you will trouble your memory, you will recall that I did, on first learning you came from West Wyke, ask after Mr. and Miss Battishill. I remember that he had a paralytic stroke, but I recall as well that he showed good signs of recovery.’ ’I am afraid, Countess, that he stands the chance of another stroke; for he is menaced with a great evil, and any profound agitation is likely to bring on a second seizure.’ ’I am very sorry to hear it.’ ’His affairs are involved to such an extent that it will be necessary for his property to be sold, and he will have to leave West Wyke.’ ’Then he can go and live in France; anywhere must be better than that dismal old house on a barren moor. It is best that it should be so. He will escape from a dungeon.’ ’You do not understand that his heart is bound up with West Wyke, and that to transplant him from the home of his ancestors will be to kill him.’ ’He thinks West Wyke a Paradise only because he has never crossed the Channel. When he reaches a nook where the sun shines and the flowers ever bloom, he will thank Heaven for having released him from his prison and exile in that wretched house and on that howling waste.’ ’Countess, you are young, and have no conception of the power that association has on the old. You can begin life anywhere, and everywhere hopes and interests start up. To the old it is not so, they are without hopes, and their only pleasure is in recollection. To the aged the looking back is almost as sweet as the looking forward is to the young.’ ’Then let him sit down in an arbour of roses, and dream of the past there; not in a dingy old parlour with smoked ceiling, and the rain pattering against the window.’ ’I fear that he will be turned destitute into the world, or, if not destitute, nearly so; and to a broken and sick man that means death.’ ’He can hardly be worse off elsewhere than he is now.’ ’He will have to go into a new home and accommodate himself to that, at a time of life and in a condition of health unfitting him for a change. You are unfeeling, Countess.’ ’Pardon me, I am not. I know Mr. Battishill, and I respect his many good qualities, but I cannot put myself in his frame of mind. It seems to me that, were I he, all thought of being allowed to leave such a spot, with the world before me, would fill me, if sick and dying, with new life. I would start up in my bed and cry out, Take me to France; there I know I shall be well.’