She nodded, and he suddenly perceived that this was one of the speeches wherein he had failed of perfect tact. Yet to modify it needed some courage. "I should say one other--one other, if I may make so bold," he added. She did not answer and he considered before continuing. Then he decided that he could not leave the matter there. Yet he was cautious. "You mustn’t think the worse of me for it. I don’t mean anything by it to cause you any uneasiness. But you’re the one, Miss Rhoda. I should certainly be very vexed if anything happened to you." "Thank you, I’m sure, Mr. Snell." "Don’t," he said. "These things don’t merit thanks. I’ve never told a lie, and so I won’t hold my reason back. I think a lot of your character: that’s why I should be sorry if harm happened to you." "We’ve understood each other very well, I believe." "Very well indeed; and you’ve taught me a lot about the female sex. And, but for you, I don’t suppose I should ever have knowed anything at all about them. I may tell you, owing to your large understanding, that I’ve often considered about the sense of marrying. But I’m sure I don’t know. When you look round--the heart sinks." "Yes, it does." Mr. Snell did look round, and the beautiful woman roused some faint, feeble flicker of his anæmic passion. "I grant you that the wedded state as shown by other people--and yet I won’t go so far as Bartley Crocker do." "How far’s that then?" "Mind, don’t you say it against him. I’ve no wish to be thought a tale-bearer. But, in open speech at the bar of Shillabeer’s public-house, he said that though you hear of happy marriages, you never see them. Now that’s too far-reaching--eh?" "Not much. He’s not far out, I reckon." "Well, you know better than me; but, begging pardon for mentioning her again, your own sister is as happy as a bird. And I really don’t say it’s impossible to be happy with a home of your own." "The right ones never meet. I’d warn every man and woman against it for my part." With this speech Rhoda quite extinguished the paltry flicker in Mr. Snell’s broad bosom. He looked rather frightened. He stroked his beard. At heart he felt a sort of relief that even the shadow of disquiet was now banished in the light of her plain statement. "If that’s your opinion, ’tis no part for a common man like me to say a word against it," he answered. "Sometimes--I won’t deny it--I’ve thought, in uplifted moments, that the married state with such a meek nature as mine--and then again, however--" "I speak what I know; but nobody can be sure they’re right, I suppose. What do you think about it?" asked Rhoda. But why she gave him this loophole she knew not. Her interest in Mr. Snell was at a low ebb to-day, and her own thoughts filled her spirit to the exclusion of all else. Still she was always content with him. He appeared to her to be a sensible and responsible man whose opinion was better worth having than that of most people.