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 monitor. There was a sense of vacuum behind the knitted chocolate waistcoat that was really the devil.

"It is like this, you know—" The young man floundered and came down rather awkwardly at fence Number One. "Adela and I—well, fact is, we haven't—"

The Governing Classes showed great patience.

"We haven't sort of—you know—?"

"I am afraid we don't, my boy," said S. of P. with the blandness that goes so well with conscious power.

"The end of October is such a good time," said Mother, "especially if there is to be an autumn session."

"Oh, yes," said the young man, "but, fact is, Adela and I have never quite hit it off from the start."

The Governing Classes, with lowered eyelids, looked at one another across the chaste expanse of Messrs. Maple's hearthrug. The pause was rather trying. Yes, an awful pity about that second Green Chartreuse.

At last S. of P. was sorry.

This may look a little inadequate on the part of S. of P. But it wasn't really. Eton and Balliol, "distinguished public service," terms of intimacy with His Majesty's late Government are not incapable of resonance on the domestic hearth. It was already clear that the higher statesmanship might have to be tempered with a little benevolent autocracy.