The only thing, said Theobald, which made
him hesitate, was that the boy might be thrown with low associates later
on if he were to be encouraged in his taste for music--a taste which
Theobald had always disliked. He had observed with regret that Ernest
had ere now shown rather a hankering after low company, and he might make
acquaintance with those who would corrupt his innocence. Christina
shuddered at this, but when they had aired their scruples sufficiently
they felt (and when people begin to "feel," they are invariably going to
take what they believe to be the more worldly course) that to oppose
Alethea's proposal would be injuring their son's prospects more than was
right, so they consented, but not too graciously.
After a time, however, Christina got used to the idea, and then
considerations occurred to her which made her throw herself into it with
characteristic ardour. If Miss Pontifex had been a railway stock she
might have been said to have been buoyant in the Battersby market for
some few days; buoyant for long together she could never be, still for a
time there really was an upward movement. Christina's mind wandered to
the organ itself; she seemed to have made it with her own hands; there
would be no other in England to compare with it for combined sweetness
and power.
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