Page:Eliot - Felix Holt, the Radical, vol. I, 1866.djvu/73

Rh am glad to perceive that an Eastern climate has not been unfavourable to him."

"No," said Harold, shaking Jermyn's hand carelessly, and speaking with more than his usual rapid brusqueness, "the question is, whether the English climate will agree with me. It's deuced shifting and damp; and as for the food, it would be the finest thing in the world for this country if the southern cooks would change their religion, get persecuted, and fly to England, as the old silk-weavers did."

"There are plenty of foreign cooks for those who are rich enough to pay for them, I suppose," said Mrs. Transome, "but they are unpleasant people to have about one's house."

"Gad! I don't think so," said Harold. "The old servants are sure to quarrel with them."

"That's no concern of mine. The old servants will have to put up with my man Dominic, who will show them how to cook and do everything else, in a way that will rather astonish them."

"Old people are not so easily taught to change all their ways, Harold."

"Well, they can give up and watch the young ones," said Harold, thinking only at that moment