The dean answered, "The number who go to battle unwillingly, and by force, are few; and for the others, they have previously sold their lives to the state." "For what?" "For soldiers' and sailors' pay." "My father used to tell me, we must not take away our own lives; but he forgot to tell me we might sell them for others to take away." "William," said the dean to his son, his patience tired with his nephew's persevering nonsense, "explain to your cousin the difference between a battle and a massacre." "A massacre," said William, rising from his seat, and fixing his eyes alternately upon his father, his mother, and the bishop (all of whom were present) for their approbation, rather than the person's to whom his instructions were to be addressed--"a massacre," said William, "is when human beings are slain, who have it not in their power to defend themselves." "Dear cousin William," said Henry, "that must ever be the case with every one who is killed." After a short hesitation, William replied: "In massacres people are put to death for no crime, but merely because they are objects of suspicion." "But in battle," said Henry, "the persons put to death are not even suspected." The bishop now condescended to end this disputation by saying emphatically, "Consider, young savage, that in battle neither the infant, the aged, the sick, nor infirm are involved, but only those in the full prime of health and vigour." As this argument came from so great and reverend a man as the bishop, Henry was obliged, by a frown from his uncle, to submit, as one refuted; although he had an answer at the veriest tip of his tongue, which it was torture to him not to utter. What he wished to say must ever remain a secret. The church has its terrors as well as the law; and Henry was awed by the dean's tremendous wig as much as Paternoster Row is awed by the Attorney-General. CHAPTER XV. If the dean had loved his wife but moderately, seeing all her faults clearly as he did, he must frequently have quarrelled with her: if he had loved her with tenderness, he must have treated her with a degree of violence in the hope of amending her failings. But having neither personal nor mental affection towards her sufficiently interesting to give himself the trouble to contradict her will in anything, he passed for one of the best husbands in the world. Lady Clementina went out when she liked, stayed at home when she liked, dressed as she liked, and talked as she liked without a word of disapprobation from her husband, and all--because he cared nothing about her. Her vanity attributed this indulgence to inordinate affection; and observers in general thought her happier in her marriage than the beloved wife who bathes her pillow with tears by the side of an angry husband, whose affection is so excessive that he unkindly upbraids her because she is--less than perfection.