Volume Ii Part 72 (2/2)
about when you went away ? but he's been better sen. So they say. I ha'n't seen him. Well Flidda,” he added, with somewhat of a sly gleam in his eye, ”do you think you're going to make up your mind to stay to hum this time?”
”I have no immediate intention of running away, Mr. Dougla.s.s,”
said Fleda, her pale cheeks turning rose as she saw him looking curiously up and down the edges of the black fox. His eye came back to hers with a good- humoured intelligence that she could hardly stand.
”It's time you was back,” said he. ”Your uncle's to hum, but he don't do me much good, whatever he does to other folks, or himself nother, as far as the farm goes; there's that corn ?”
”Very well, Mr. Dougla.s.s,” said Fleda, ”I shall be at home now, and I'll see about it.”
”_Very_ good!” said Earl, as he stepped back, ”Queechy can't get along without you, that's no mistake.”
They drove on a few minutes in silence.
”Aren't you thinking, Mr. Carleton,” said Fleda, ”that my countrymen are a strange mixture?”
”I was not thinking of them at all at this moment. I believe such a notion has crossed my mind.”
”It has crossed mine very often,” said Fleda.
”How do you read them? What is the basis of it?”
”I think, the strong self-respect which springs from the security and importance that republican inst.i.tutions give every man. But,” she added, colouring, ”I have seen very little of the world, and ought not to judge.”
”I have no doubt you are quite right,” said Mr. Carleton, smiling. ”But don't you think an equal degree of self-respect may consist with giving honour where honour is due?”
”Yes,” said Fleda, a little doubtfully, ”where religion and not republicanism is the spring of it.”
”Humility and not pride,” said he. ”Yes, you are right.”
”My countrymen do yield honour where they think it is due,”
said Fleda, ”especially where it is not claimed. They must give it to reality, not to pretension. And, I confess, I would rather see them a little rude in their independence, than cringing before mere advantages of external position ? even for my own personal pleasure.”
”I agree with you, Elfie, putting, perhaps, the last clause out of the question.”
”Now, that man,” said Fleda, smiling at his look ? ”I suppose his address must have struck you as very strange; and yet there was no want of respect under it. I am sure he has a true thorough respect, and even regard for me, and would prove it on any occasion.”
”I have no doubt of that.”
”But it does not satisfy you?”
”Not quite. I confess I should require more from any one under my control.”
”Oh, n.o.body is under control here,” said Fleda. ”That is, I mean, individual control, unless so far as self-interest comes in. I suppose that is all-powerful here as elsewhere.”
”And the reason it gives less power to individuals is, that the greater freedom of resources makes no man's interest depend so absolutely on one other man. That is a reason you cannot regret. No, your countrymen have the best of it, Elfie.
But, do you suppose that this is a fair sample of the whole country?”
”I dare not say that,” said Fleda. ”I am afraid there is not so much intelligence and cultivation everywhere. But I am sure there are many parts of the land that will bear a fair comparison with it.”
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