One hears ever of the black sheep, the few luridly glaring failures, but never of the hundreds of great and noble lives which are England's strength." "By Jove!" said Lord Tancred, "you ought to be in the House of Lords, Francis! You'd wake them up!" The financier looked down at his plate; he always lowered his eyes when he felt things.

No one must ever read what was really passing in his soul, and when he felt, it was the more difficult to conceal, he reasoned.
"I am not a snob, my friend," he said, after a mouthful of salad.

"I have no worship for aristocracy in the abstract; I am a student, a rather careful student of systems and their results, and, incidentally, a breeder of thoroughbred live stock, too, which helps one's conclusions: and above all I am an interested watcher of the progress of evolution." "You are abominably clever," said Lord Tancred.
"Think of your uncle, the Duke of Glastonbury," the financier went on.
"He fulfills his duties in every way, a munificent landlord, and a sound, level-headed politician: what other country or class could produce such as he ?" "Oh, the Duke's all right," his nephew agreed.

"He is a bit hard up like a number of us at times, but he keeps the thing going splendidly, and my cousin Ethelrida helps him.

She is a brick.