But they are too busy with
their partners to be friendly. We admire them, but they are
unconcerned with us. In Mr. Black's large family the Whaup seems
most congenial to some strangers; the name of one of Mr. Payn's
friendly lads is Legion, and Miss Broughton's dogs, with THEIR
friend Sara, and Mrs. Moberley, welcome the casual visitor with
hospitable care. Among the kindly children of a later generation
one may number a sailor man with a wooden leg; a Highland
gentleman, who, though landless, bears a king's name; an Irish
chevalier who was out in the '45; a Zulu chief who plied the axe
well; a private named Mulvaney in Her Majesty's Indian army; an
elderly sportsman of agile imagination or unparalleled experience
in remote adventure. {1} All these a person who had once
encountered them would recognise, perhaps, when he was fortunate
enough to find himself in their company.
There are children, too, of a dead author, an author seldom lauded
by critics, who, possibly, have as many living friends as any
modern characters can claim. A very large company of Christian
people are fond of Lord Welter, Charles Ravenshoe, Flora and Gus,
Lady Ascot, the boy who played fives with a brass button, and a
dozen others of Henry Kingsley's men, women, and children, whom we
have laughed with often, and very nearly cried with. For Henry
Kingsley had humour, and his children are dear to us; while which
of Charles Kingsley's far more famous offspring would be welcome--
unless it were Salvation Yeo--if we met them all in the Paradise of
Fiction?
It is not very safe, in literature as in life, to speak well of our
friends or of their families.
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