Do not pity him; congratulate him rather that the inevitable has been so long postponed.
He put on a bold face at breakfast next morning, for he could not suppose that Mrs.Baxendale would feel any obligation to keep his secret from her husband, and it was not in his character to play the knight of the dolorous visage.

You saw the rings round his eyes, but he was able to discuss the latest electioneering intelligence, and even to utter one or two more of those shrewd remarks by which he had lately been proving that politics were not unlikely to demand more of his attention some day.

But he was glad when he could get away to the drawing-room, to await Mrs.Baxendale's coming.

He tried to read in a volume of Boswell which lay out; at other times the book was his delight, now it had the succulence of a piece of straw.

He was in that state of mind when five minutes of waiting is intolerable.