"Very grand;--but the young trees show the new man. A new man may buy
a forest; but he can't get park trees."
Phineas, at the moment, was thinking how far all these things which
he saw, the mountains stretching everywhere around him, the castle,
the lake, the river, the wealth of it all, and, more than the wealth,
the nobility of the beauty, might act as temptations to Lady Laura
Standish. If a woman were asked to have the half of all this, would
it be possible that she should prefer to take the half of his
nothing? He thought it might be possible for a girl who would
confess, or seem to confess, that love should be everything. But it
could hardly be possible for a woman who looked at the world almost
as a man looked at it,--as an oyster to be opened with such weapon
as she could find ready to her hand. Lady Laura professed to have a
care for all the affairs of the world. She loved politics, and could
talk of social science, and had broad ideas about religion, and was
devoted to certain educational views. Such a woman would feel that
wealth was necessary to her, and would be willing, for the sake of
wealth, to put up with a husband without romance. Nay; might it not
be that she would prefer a husband without romance? Thus Phineas was
arguing to himself as he was driven up to the door of Loughlinter
Castle, while Mr.
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