"I tell you again," said the dean, "he is a boy of your own age; you and he are cousins, for I am his father." "How can that be?" said young Henry. "He called you _Sir_." "In this country," said the dean, "polite children do not call their parents _father_ and _mother_." "Then don't they sometimes forget to love them as such?" asked Henry. His uncle became now impatient to interrogate him in every particular concerning his father's state. Lady Clementina felt equal impatience to know where the father was, whether he were coming to live with them, wanted anything of them, and every circumstance in which her vanity was interested. Explanations followed all these questions; but which, exactly agreeing with what the elder Henry's letter has related, require no recital here. CHAPTER XII. That vanity which presided over every thought and deed of Lady Clementina was the protector of young Henry within her house. It represented to her how amiable her conduct would appear in the eye of the world should she condescend to treat this destitute nephew as her own son; what envy such heroic virtue would excite in the hearts of her particular friends, and what grief in the bosoms of all those who did not like her. The dean was a man of no inconsiderable penetration. He understood the thoughts which, upon this occasion, passed in the mind of his wife, and in order to ensure her kind treatment of the boy, instead of reproaching her for the cold manner in which she had at first received him, he praised her tender and sympathetic heart for having shown him so much kindness, and thus stimulated her vanity to be praised still more. William, the mother's own son, far from apprehending a rival in this savage boy, was convinced of his own pre-eminence, and felt an affection for him--though rather as a foil than as a cousin. He sported with his ignorance upon all occasions, and even lay in wait for circumstances that might expose it; while young Henry, strongly impressed with everything which appeared new to him, expressed, without reserve, the sensations which those novelties excited, wholly careless of the construction put on his observations. He never appeared either offended or abashed when laughed at; but still pursued his questions, and still discovered his wonder at many replies made to him, though "simpleton," "poor silly boy," and "idiot," were vociferated around him from his cousin, his aunt, and their constant visitor the bishop. His uncle would frequently undertake to instruct him; so indeed would the bishop; but Lady Clementina, her son, and the greatest part of her companions, found something so irresistibly ridiculous in his remarks, that nothing but immoderate laughter followed; they thought such folly had even merit in the way of entertainment, and they wished him no wiser.