He was already prepared for many changes, and for customs new to him. Yet he was hardly ready for the complete reversal of social rules as he experienced at this dinner. For the subjects of talk were started by the men, who almost monopolised the conversation; while the ladies merely threw in a word here and there, which served as a stimulus, and showed appreciation rather than a desire to join in the argument. And such talk! He had been accustomed to hear the ladies talk almost uninterruptedly of politics--that is, of personal matters, squabbles in the House, disputes about precedence, intrigues for title and higher rank--and dress. Nothing else, as a rule, occupied the dinner-table. The men, who rarely spoke, were occasionally questioned about some cricket-match, some long race, or some other kind of athletics. This was due to politeness only, however; for, the question put and answered, the questioner showed how little interest she took in the subject by instantly returning to the subject previously in discussion. But at this table,--the Professor's--no, the Bishop's table,--the men talked of art, and in terms which Lord Chester could not understand. Nevertheless, he gathered that the so-called art of the Academicians was a thing absolutely beneath contempt. They talked of science, especially the square-headed youth Jack Kennion, to whom they deferred as to an authority; and he spoke of subjects, forms, and laws of which Lord Chester was absolutely ignorant: they talked of history, and all, including the Bishop's daughters--strange, how easily the new proselyte fell into the way of considering how the highest education is best fitted for men!--showed as intimate an acquaintance with the past as the Professor herself. They talked of religion; and here all deferred to the Bishop, who, while he spoke with authority, invited discussion. Strangest thing of all!--every man spoke as if his own opinion were worth considering. There was not the slightest deference to authority. The great and standard work of Cornelia Nipper on Political Economy, in which she summed up all that has been said, and left, as was taught at Cambridge, nothing more to be said; the _Encyclopædia of Science_, written by Isabella Bunter, in which she showed the absurdity of pushing knowledge into worthless regions; the sermons and dogmas of the illustrious and Reverend Violet Swandown, considered by the orthodox as containing guidance and comfort for the soul under all possible circumstances,--these works were openly scoffed at and derided.