Page:Arminell, a social romance (1896).djvu/223

Rh knows how equivocal that place is. He is regarded as one thing, and he is another."

"I daresay I made a mistake in bringing him here so near to his father."

"So very near to his father, and yet so separated from him."

"I suppose so," said Lord Lamerton, "education does separate."

"It separates so widely that those who are divided by it hardly regard each other as belonging to the same human family."

"I daresay it is so; the miners cannot judge me fairly about the manganese, because we stand on different educational levels."

"It is not only those beneath the line who misjudge those above; it is sometimes the superiors who misunderstand those below."

"Very possibly; but, my dear, that lower class, with limited culture and narrow views, is nowadays the dominating class. It is, in fact, the privileged class, it pays no taxes, and yet elects our rulers; our class is politically swamped, we exist upon sufferance. Formerly the castle dominated the cottage, but now the cottages command the castle. We, the educated and wealthy, are maintained as parochial cows, to furnish the parishioners with milk, and when we run dry are cut up to be eaten, and our bones treated with sulphuric acid and given to the earth to dress it for mangel-wurzel."

Arminell was vexed at the crafty way in which, according to her view, her father shifted ground, when she approached too nearly the delicate secret. She wondered whether she had spoken plainly enough to let him understand how much she knew. It was not her desire to come to plain words, she would spare him that humiliation. It would be quite enough, it would answer her purpose fully to let him