He had married Jenny
and Archie himself, and stayed a month on their ostrich farm, which
he declared was a lesson on woman's rights, since Mrs. Ostrich was
heedless and indifferent as to her eggs, but was regularly hunted
back to the duties by her husband, who always had two wives, and
regularly forced them to take turns in sitting; a system which
Herbert observed would be needful if the rights of women were to
work. He had brought offerings of eggs and feathers to Lady
Rosamond, and pockets full of curiosities for all his village
friends; also, he had been at the Cape, had seen Glen Fraser,
rejoiced the inhabitants with his accounts of Anne, and brought home
a delightful budget for her.
But the special cause of his radiance was a letter he brought from
his father to Mr. Bindon. The family living, which had decided his
own profession, had fallen vacant, and his father, wishing perhaps
not to be thought cruel and unnatural by his wife, had made no
appointment until Herbert's return, well knowing that he would
decide against himself: and feeling that, as things stood, it would
be an awkward exercise of patronage to put him in at once.
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