"Damn them! Damn them both!" exclaimed I and, in that moment, caught my breath, shocked, amazed, and not a little ashamed at this outburst, an exhibition so extremely foreign to my usually placid nature. 'To swear is a painful exhibition of vulgarity, and passion uncontrolled lessens one's dignity and is a sign of weakness.' Remembering this, one of my wonderful aunt's incontrovertible maxims, I grew abashed (as I say) by reason of this my deplorable lapse. And yet: "'Ladylike!'" I repeated the opprobrious epithet for the third time and scowled up at the placid moon. And this, merely because I had a shrinking horror of all brutal and sordid things, a detestation for anything smacking of vulgarity or bad taste. To me, the subtle beauty of line or colour, the singing music of a phrase, were of more account than the reek of stables or the whooping clamour and excitement of the hunting-field, my joys being rather raptures of the soul than the more material pleasures of the flesh. "And was it," I asked myself, "was it essential to exchange buffets with a 'Camberwell Chicken,' to shoot and be shot at, to spur sweating and unwilling horses over dangerous fences--were such things truly necessary to prove one's manhood? Assuredly not! And yet--'Ladylike!'" Moved by a sudden impulse I turned from the lattice to the elegant luxuriousness of my bedchamber, its soft carpets, rich hangings and exquisite harmonies of colour; and coming before the cheval mirror I stood to view and examine myself as I had never done hitherto, surveying my reflection not with the accustomed eyes of Peregrine Vereker, but rather with the coldly appraising eyes of a stranger, and beheld this: A youthful, slender person of no great stature, clothed in garments elegantly unostentatious. His face grave and of a saturnine cast--but the features fairly regular. His complexion sallow--but clear and without blemish. His hair rather too long--but dark and crisp-curled. His brow a little too prominent--but high and broad. His eyes dark and soft--but well-opened and direct. His nose a little too short to please me--but otherwise well-shaped. His mouth too tender in its curves--but the lips close and firm. His chin too smoothly rounded, at a glance--but when set, looks determined enough. His whole aspect not altogether unpleasing, though I yearned mightily to see him a few inches taller. Thus then I took dispassionate regard to, and here as dispassionately set down, my outer being; as to my inner, that shall appear, I hope, as this history progresses.