"These West Indian years were the great days of the family," said
Titbottom, with an air of majestic and regal regret, pausing, and
musing, in our little parlor, like a late Stuart in exile, remembering
England.
Prue raised her eyes from her work, and looked at him with subdued
admiration; for I have observed that, like the rest of her sex, she
has a singular sympathy with the representative of a reduced family.
Perhaps it is their finer perception, which leads these tender-hearted
women to recognize the divine right of social superiority so much more
readily than we; and yet, much as Titbottom was enhanced in my wife's
admiration by the discovery that his dusky sadness of nature and
expression was, as it were, the expiring gleam and late twilight of
ancestral splendors, I doubt if Mr. Bourne would have preferred him
for book-keeper a moment sooner upon that account. In truth, I have
observed, down town, that the fact of your ancestors doing nothing, is
not considered good proof that you can do anything.
But Prue and her sex regard sentiment more than action, and I
understand easily enough why she is never tired of hearing me read of
Prince Charlie.
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