“You mean the Volunteers?” said Sir John, “but I never believed in the Volunteers. It is all very well to let them amuse themselves, soldiering. And, perhaps, in the country where they would be officered by the gentlemen they know,” he continued after a moment’s pause, with again Arthur, and not the Volunteers, in his thoughts, and echoing his wife’s sigh, “they might be of some use; but I don’t put any faith in them for the defence of the country. Thank you, my dear; on a wet afternoon like this one is glad of a cup of tea.” Sir John was generally glad of his cup of tea, if not for one reason, then for another, because it was wet, or because it was cold, or because it was sultry and stifling, or else for no reason at all. It formed a break in the long afternoon when there was nothing more interesting to do. For as he stood with his back to the fire, and his cup in his hand, he went on dully talking, as was his way. “It is the very essence of democracy you know--when you substitute what they call the citizen soldier, the man that is supposed to fight in his own defence, for the soldier that is paid for defending us: the very essence of democracy--it makes out that one man is just as good as another and that the Hodges want as much taking care of as you and I.” “So they do surely, papa,” said Lucy, “their lives are as precious to them as ours are--to us.” “You don’t know anything about it, Lucy; they are not half so important to the country, and it’s the country we ought to think of first,” said Sir John. “Without an army where should we be? The throne would have no authority--Volunteers mean democracy, my dear.” “And Jack Hodge is your true patriot,” said his wife. “Exactly so. I will tell his mother that is my opinion the next time I am in the village. A foolish woman with her Dissenters to put nonsense into her head. What could the boy do better. But Bertie ought to have been there? Bertie ought to have gone,” said the Baronet. “I allow there are bad smells in the cottages, Lucy; but surely, if I can bear it, he ought to bear it; and you, you never say anything about the smells--I don’t think Bertie can be doing his duty as a clergyman ought. The young men of the present day are beyond me,” Sir John added with another sigh; and he put down his cup with a dreary shrug of his shoulders, and shook his grey head as he went slowly away.