Young Uxbridge, when he came in spick and span, in the freshest of morning coats and fashionable ties--for which things Law had a keen eye, though he could not indulge in them--looked somewhat askance at the slouching figure of the new pupil. But, though he was the son of a canon and in the best society, young Uxbridge was not more studious, and he was by nature even less gifted, than Law. Of two stupid young men, one may have all the advantage over another which talent can give, without having any talent to brag of. Law was very dense with respect to books, but he understood a great deal more quickly what was said to him, and had a play of humour and meaning in his face, and sense of the amusing and absurd, if nothing more, which distinguished him from his companion, who was steadily level and obtuse all round, and never saw what anything meant. Thus, though one knew more than the other, the greater ignoramus was the more agreeable pupil of the two; and the Minor Canon began to take an amused interest in Law as Law. He kept him to luncheon after the other was gone, and encouraged the boy to talk, giving him such a meal as Law had only dreamt of. He encouraged him to talk, which perhaps was not quite right of Mr. Ashford, and heard a great deal about his family, and found out that, though Lottie was right, Law was not perhaps so utterly wrong as he thought. Law was very wrong; yet when he thus heard both sides of the question, the Minor Canon perceived that it was possible to sympathise with Lottie in her forlorn and sometimes impatient struggle against the _vis inertiæ_ of this big brother, and yet on the other hand to have an amused pity for the big brother, too, who was not brutal but only dense, gaping with wonder at the finer spirit that longed and struggled to stimulate him into something above himself. So stimulated Law never would be. He did not understand even what she wanted, what she would have; but he was not without some good in him. No doubt he would make an excellent settler in the back-woods, working hard there though he would not work here, and ready to defend himself against any tribe of savages; and he would not make a bad soldier. But to be stimulated into a first-class man in an examination, or an any-class man, to be made into a male Lottie of fine perceptions and high ambition, that was what Law would never be. “But she is quite right,” said Law; “something must be done. I suppose you have heard, Mr. Ashford, as everybody seems to have heard, that the governor is going to marry again?” “I did hear it. Will that make a great difference to your sister and you?”