I was yet engaged on this most critical examination of my person when I was interrupted by the sound of footsteps on the flagged terrace beneath my open window and the voices of my two uncles as they passed slowly to and fro, each word of their conversation very plain to hear upon the warm, still air. Honour should have compelled me to close my ears or the lattice; had I done so, how different might this history have been, how utterly different my career. As it was, attracted by the sound of my own name, I turned from contemplation of my person and, coming to the window, leaned out again. "Poor Peregrine," said my uncle George for the second time. "Why the pity, George? Curse and confound it, wherefore the pity? Our youth is a perfect ass, an infernal young fish, a puppy-dog--pah!" "Aye, but," quoth my uncle George (and I could distinguish the faint jingle of his spurs), "we roasted him devilishly to-night between us, Jervas, and never a word out o' the lad--" "Egad, Julia did the talking for him--" "Ha, yes--dooce take me, she did so!" exclaimed uncle George. "What an amazingly magnificent creature she is--" "And did ye mark our youth's cool insolence, his disdainful airs--the cock of his supercilious nose--curst young puppy!" "Most glorious eyes in Christendom," continued my uncle George, "always make me feel so dooced--er--so curst humble--no, humble's not quite the word; what I do mean is--" "Fatuous, George?" suggested Uncle Jervas a trifle impatiently. "Unworthy--yes, unworthy and er--altogether dooced, d'ye see--her whole life one of exemplary self-sacrifice and so forth, d'ye see, Jervas--" "Exactly, George! Julia will never marry, we know, while she has this precious youth to pet and pamper and cherish--" "Instead of us, Jervas!" "Us? George, don't be a fool! She couldn't wed us both, man!" "Why, no!" sighed uncle George. "She'd ha' to be content wi' one of us, to be sure, and that one would be--" "Myself, George!" "Aye!" quoth uncle George, sighing more gustily than ever. "Begad, I think it would, Jervas." "Though, mark me, George, I have sometimes thought she has the preposterous lack of judgment to prefer you." "No--did you though!" exclaimed my uncle George, spurs jingling again. "B'gad, and did you though--dooce take me!" "Aye, George, I did, but only very occasionally. Of course, were she free of this incubus Peregrine, free to live for her own happiness instead of his, I should have her wedded and wifed while you were thinking about it." "Aye," sighed my uncle George, "you were always such an infernal dasher--" "As it is, the boy will grow into a priggish, self-satisfied do-nothing, and she into an adoring, solitary old woman--" "Julia! An old woman! Good God! Hush, Jervas--it sounds dooced indecent!"