"Well, I don't know that. I'm of an old-fashioned school, which holds that no gentleman should so carry on his _amourettes_ that the world should talk about them. But the idea of your thinking that I should be astonished when you told me that you were head over ears in love with--with Miss Lambert! _Nourri dans le sérail j'en connais les detours_, Master Miles." "And if not astonished, you were also not annoyed?" "Annoyed! Not the least bit in the world. I don't mean to say that the matter looks to me entirely one of plain-sailing, my dear boy; there are certain difficulties which will naturally arise." "Do you think that Grace's friends will make any obstacle? By the way, my dear lord, do you know anything of Miss Lambert's relations? I have never heard of or seen any connection but Mrs. Bloxam; but you who are so intimate with the young lady will probably know all about them." A half-comic look of embarrassment overshadowed Lord Sandilands' face as he heard this inquiry, and he waited for a moment before he replied, "Not I, indeed, my dear Miles; Miss Lambert has never spoken to me of her relations--indeed, I understood from her that she was an orphan, left to Mrs. Bloxam's charge. I shouldn't think you need look for any objection to your marriage being made by the lady's friends." "That is one point happily settled; then the world?" "The what?" "The opinion of the world." "Ah, that's a very different matter! You're afraid of what people will say about your marrying a singer?" "To you, dear old friend, I will confess candidly that I am. Not that I have any position, God knows, on the strength of which to give myself airs." "My dear boy, that's where you mistake. If you _had_ a position, you might marry not merely a charming and amiable and lovely girl like this, against whom no word ought to be uttered, but even a person without the smallest rag of reputation; and the world would say very little about it, and would speedily be silenced. Look at--no need, however, to quote examples. What I have said is the fact, and you know it." "I am forced to acknowledge the truth of your remark, but while acknowledging it, I shall not permit the fact to turn me from my purpose. If Miss Lambert will accept me for a husband, I will gladly risk all the tattle of all the old cats in Belgravia." "Your sentiments do you credit, my dear boy," said the old nobleman with a smile, "though the juxtaposition of 'tattle' and 'cats' is scarcely happy. I've noticed that when people are in love, the arrangement of their sentences is seldom harmonious. I suppose you feel tolerably certain of Miss Lambert's answer to your intended proposal. You are too much a man of the present day to anticipate any doubt in the matter." "I should not be worth Miss Lambert's acceptance if I had any such vanity; and I know you're only joking in ascribing it to me."