Page:Our Grandfather by Vítězslav Hálek (1887).pdf/55

 answered without circumlocution “Your son must get married.”

And at once he had so many reasons for it at the tip of his tongue that grandfather’s head went round.

He said that Uncle John dissipated his energies by reflections which afflicted him, that his looks and thoughts fastened only on women, and that what the women altogether had so long failed to effect a single woman would effect if he could be brought acquainted with her.

Grandfather thought all this supremely wise, and wondered at himself for not thinking of it before, and as for Novak, faith he was a man more sensible than a doctor of law.

Novak, however, reasoned according to his trade, and if he had been a butcher he would have recommended that uncle should eat plenty of meat. Had he been an innkeeper he would have recommended plenty of beer. Being a go between in love affairs, he recommended that uncle should wive.

And all at once he knew everything about a bride in prospect, and described her in such glowing colours that Horakoff’s daughter at Brizoff vanished before her, and was not fit to reach her water at table.

Grandfather thought that he had won “terns,” and he had no need to trouble himself further about anything; for Novak took upon himself all trouble and eased grandfather’s mind by promising that Uncle John should conform to everything.

After this grandfather himself took Uncle John in hand. After suitable circumlocutions, he asked him, as if casually, whether he yet thought of marriage, seeing that