For no matter how well we may
know a thing- how clearly we may see a certain patch of colour, for
example, as red, it shakes us and knocks us about to find another
see it, or be more than half inclined to see it, as green.
Theobald had generally begun to get a little impatient before the
end of the visit, but the impression formed during the earlier part
was the one which the visitor had carried away with him. Theobald
never discussed any of the boys with Ernest. It was Christina who
did this. Theobald let them come, because Christina, in a quiet,
persistent way, insisted on it; when they did come he behaved, as I
have said, civilly, but he did not like it, whereas Christina did like
it very much; she would have had half Roughborough and half
Cambridge to come and stay at Battersby if she could have managed
it, and if it would not have cost so much money: she liked their
corning, so that she might make a new acquaintance, and she liked
tearing them to pieces and flinging the bits over Ernest as soon as
she had had enough of them.
The worst of it was that she had so often proved to be right. Boys
and young men are violent in their affections, but they are seldom
very constant; it is not till they get older that they really know the
kind of friend they want; in their earlier essays young men are simply
learning to judge character.
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