A short, slight man of five-and-twenty, pale and sallow of skin, with close-cropped black hair, penetrating light gray eyes, set too near together in his head, a long, clean-shaved upper lip, short nose and wide mouth, of which the lower jaw slightly protruded; he was not as directly ugly as this description would suggest, but was fatally plain, insignificant, and uninteresting. His manners, too, in contrast with the easy geniality of his friend, were abrupt and sarcastic, and his voice was far from pleasant. To some men he was attractive by reason of his unusual intelligence and originality; but to the ordinary lawn-tennis-playing young lady there was nothing to recommend his appearance or his manners. The attention shown to him by the entire Braithwaite family was the more remarkable in that he took very little notice of the girls, scarcely even troubling himself to look at them, and showing clearly his wish to escape from their friendly blandishments. Mrs. Braithwaite was his mother’s second cousin, which accounted somewhat for the favor shown him over and above what was displayed toward his companion; but to his own cynical mind the true reason of the family attentions was that here were four marriageable girls, all in want of a wealthy husband, and that he, Viscount Carthew, only son of the Earl of Northborough, and heir to a splendid rent-roll as well as to the fortune of his mother, who had been an American heiress, was an admirable _parti_, whereas the handsome young giant beside him possessed little in the world but his muscles and sinews and the big black mare, who stood now pawing the ground, impatient to set off again upon their travels. When at last the two friends had ridden down the gravel drive, passed out of the gates, and waved a last good-by to Mr. Braithwaite’s pretty niece and daughters, Lord Carthew was not slow in expressing his opinion concerning them. “Isn’t it truly disgusting, Hilary,” he began, “to see four healthy young women with good looks, for such as admire well-groomed animals without expression, each and every one of them trained to set her cap at an ugly and ill-tempered young man, solely because he will have money and a title? If I were passably good-looking or attractive in manner, I could find it in my heart to make excuses for them. But as it is, they make me long to ‘take some savage woman,’ as the fellow in ‘Locksley Hall’ suggested, and go and live with her in some island where the currency is cowrie shells, and the title of lord means no more than that of chimney sweep.” Hilary Pritchard laughed with the easy-going good nature characteristic of big young men.