Whats Mines Mine | Page 4

his wife; his black hair
had but begun to be touched with silver; he seemed a man without an
atom of care more than humanity counts reasonable; his speech was not
unlike that of an Englishman, for, although born in Glasgow, he had
been to Oxford. He spoke respectfully to his wife, and with a pleasant
playfulness to his daughters; his manner was nowise made to order, but
natural enough; his grammar was as good as conversation requires;
everything was respectable about him-and yet-he was one remove at
least from a gentleman. Something hard to define was lacking to that
idea of perfection.
Mr. Peregrine Palmer's grandfather had begun to make the family
fortune by developing a little secret still in a remote highland glen,
which had acquired a reputation for its whisky, into a great superterrene
distillery. Both he and his son made money by it, and it had "done
well" for Mr. Peregrine also. With all three of them the making of
money had been the great calling of life. They were diligent in business,
fervent in spirit, serving Mammon, and founding claim to consideration
on the fact. Neither Jacob nor John Palmer's worst enemy had ever
called him a hypocrite: neither had been suspected of thinking to serve
Mammon and God. Both had gone regularly to church, but neither had
taught in a Sunday school, or once gone to a week-day sermon.
Peregrine had built a church and a school. He did not now take any
active part in the distillery, but worked mainly in money itself.
Jacob, the son of a ship-chandler in Greenock, had never thought about
gentleman or no gentleman; but his son John had entertained the
difference, and done his best to make a gentleman of Peregrine; and
neither Peregrine nor any of his family ever doubted his father's success;
and if he had not quite succeeded, I would have the blame laid on

Peregrine and not on either father or grandfather. For a man to GROW
a gentleman, it is of great consequence that his grandfather should have
been an honest man; but if a man BE a gentleman, it matters little what
his grandfather or grandmother either was. Nay--if a man be a
gentleman, it is of the smallest consequence, except for its own sake,
whether the world counts him one or not.
Mr. Peregrine Palmer rose from the table with a merry remark on the
prolongation of the meal by his girls, and went towards the door.
"Are you going to shoot?" asked his wife.
"Not to-day. But I am going to look after my guns. I daresay they've
got them all right, but there's nothing like seeing to a thing yourself!"
Mr. Palmer had this virtue, and this very gentlemanlike way--that he
always gave his wife as full an answer as he would another lady. He
was not given to marital brevity.
He was there for the grouse-shooting--not exactly, only "as it were." He
did not care VERY much about the sport, and had he cared nothing,
would have been there all the same. Other people, in what he counted
his social position, shot grouse, and he liked to do what other people
did, for then he felt all right: if ever he tried the gate of heaven, it
would be because other people did. But the primary cause of his being
so far in the north was the simple fact that he had had the chance of
buying a property very cheap--a fine property of mist and cloud,
heather and rock, mountain and moor, and with no such reputation for
grouse as to enhance its price. "My estate" sounded well, and after a
time of good preserving he would be able to let it well, he trusted. No
sooner was it bought than his wife and daughters were eager to visit it;
and the man of business, perceiving it would cost him much less if they
passed their autumns there instead of on the continent, proceeded at
once to enlarge the house and make it comfortable. If they should never
go a second time, it would, with its perfect appointments, make the
shooting there more attractive!
They had arrived the day before. The journey had been fatiguing, for a

great part of it was by road; but they were all in splendid health, and
not too tired to get up at a reasonable hour the next day.
CHAPTER II.
A SHORT GLANCE OVER THE SHOULDER.

Mr. Peregrine was the first of the Palmer family to learn that there was
a Palmer coat of arms. He learned it at college, and on this wise.
One day a fellow-student, who pleased himself with what he called
philology, remarked that his father must have been a hit of a humorist
to name