A Woman of Culture, Chapter XII-XIV [pp. 771-801]

i88i.] A WOMAAr OF CUlTURE. 795
MeDonell, seemed to be suffering from some concealed emotion.
Sir John alone was serene as a summer sky, although a comical
glint in i~Is eyes as he looked at the priest argued the existence
of a predicament.
"Miss Fullerton," said he persuasively, "please do not regard the utterances of the gentleman, or attach to them the importance they would have if our friend were in perfect health.
In appointing me as your spokesman you honor me, and I am
grateflil. But I must ask you first to speak~and then you shall
have a representative opinion from me-one, too, that gallantry,
and patriotism, and sincerity shall be patrons of, I can assure
you."
This was evidently fair and emphatic. So unequivocal a declaration from the attorney~general seemed to create considerable interest among the gentlemen, and they closed around in various attitudes of respectful and deep attention.
"Yet before I venture to be so bold," said Olivia, "I should
like to hear what has been said by each of the disputants on the
subject."
The priest was about to take upon himself the reply when
McDonell sharply interrupted:
"To do that would take some hours, Miss Fullerton, for all of
them, with the exception of Killany, perhaps, were as verbose as
you could desire. Sir John managed to say nothing in a great
many words. His opinion amounts to this: if the weathercock
people swing one way, so will he; if they swing another, so will
he."
"Mr. McDonell!" said the knight reproachfully.
"His reverence," continued the invalid, "who has spent most
of his life in ti~e United States, and was born in Ireland, attempted, with the genius of a cosmopolitan, to take the question
from an Irish, an American, a Canadian, and a papal point of
view; but they all so flatly contradicted one another that he
ended by leaving the solution to the future. A pretty hole to
crawl out oi, upoii my word!
"Killany, in spite of his English birth, being an out-and-out
American sympathizer, said that the attention of Americans
had not yet been directed to the annexation of Canada-in the
face of`76 and 1812 he said that, Miss Fullerton-and he added
that thinkers like himself were decidedly averse to it. It would
be to the advantage of neither country: not to the United States,
which would become altogether too unwieldy for management;
and not to Canada, which would suffer in losing her nationality.