Anthony Trollope: The Belton Estate

7. CHAPTER VII: MISS AMEDROZ GOES TO PERIVALE (continued)

'Then I certainly must hate him. And clever?'

'Well not what you would call clever. He is very clever about fields and cattle.'

'Come, there is some relief in that.'

'But you must not mistake me. He is clever; and then there's a way about him of doing everything just as he likes it, which is wonderful. You feel quite sure that he'll become master of everything.'

'But I do not feel at all sure that I should like him better for that

'But he doesn't meddle in things that he doesn't understand. And then he is so generous! His spending all that money down there is only done because he thinks it will make the place pleasanter to papa.'

'Has he got plenty of money?'

'Oh, plenty! At least, I think so. He says that he has.'

'The idea of any man owning that he had got plenty of money! What a happy mortal! And then to be handsome, and omnipotent, and to understand cattle and fields! One would strive to emulate him rather than envy him, had not one learned to acknowledge that it is not given to every one to get to Corinth.'

'You may laugh at him, but you'd like him if you knew him.'

'One never can be sure of that from a lady's account of a man. When a man talks to me about another man, I can generally tell whether I should like him or not particularly if I know the man well who is giving the description; but it is quite different when a woman is the describer.'

'You mean that you won't take my word?'