"I should if it were the only business, but it needn't be, and you don't make it so. My father speaks very highly of the way you look after your property; and he knows what attending to an estate is. And then you have so many opportunities of being kind and useful to the people about you that you might do more good that way than by working night and day at a profession. Then you owe much to yourself, because if every one began with himself, and educated himself, and became satisfied and happy with doing his best, there would be no bad conduct and wretchedness to call for interference. I don't see why you should be ashamed of shooting and hunting and all that, and doing them as well as anybody else, or far better, as I hear people say. I don't think a man is bound to have ambition and try to become famous: you might be of much greater use in the world, even in such a little place as Eglosilyan, than if you were in Parliament. I did say to Mrs. Trelyon that I should like to see you in Parliament, because one has a natural pride in any person one admires and likes very much, and one wishes--" He saw the quick look of fear that sprang to her eyes--not a sudden appearance of shy embarrassment, but of absolute fear--and he was almost as startled by her blunder as she herself was. He hastily came to her rescue. He thanked her in a few rapid and formal words for her patience and advice; and, as he saw she was trying to turn away and hide the mortification visible on her face, he shook hands with her and let her go. Then he turned. He had been startled, it is true, and grieved to see the pain her chance words had caused her. But now a great glow of delight rose up within him, and he could have called aloud to the blue skies and the silent woods because of the joy that filled his heart. They were but chance words, of course. They were uttered with no deliberate intention: on the contrary, her quick look of pain showed how bitterly she regretted the blunder. Moreover, he congratulated himself on his rapid piece of acting, and assured himself that she would believe that he had not noticed that admission of hers. They were idle words: she would forget them. The incident, so far as she was concerned, was gone.