 see one of
his own familiar friends go over to the enemy's camp. For no matter how well we
may know a thing - how clearly we may see a certain patch of colour, for
example, as red - it shakes us and knocks us about to find another see it, or be
more than half inclined to see it as green.
    Theobald had generally begun to get a little impatient before the end of the
visit but the impression formed during the earlier part was the one which the
visitor had generally carried away with him. Theobald never discussed any of the
boys with Ernest. It was Christina who did this. Theobald let them come, because
Christina in a quiet persistent way insisted on it; when they did come he
behaved as I have said civilly, but he did not like it, whereas Christina did
like it very much; she would have had half Roughborough and half Cambridge to
come and stay at Battersby if she could have managed it, and if it would not
have cost so much money; she liked their coming, so that she might make a new
acquaintance, and she liked tearing them to pieces and flinging the bits over
Ernest as soon as she had had enough of them.
    The worst of it was that she had so often proved to be right. Boys and young
men are violent in their affections, but they are seldom very constant; it is
not till they get older that they really know the kind of friend they want; in
their earlier essays young men are simply learning to judge character. Ernest
had been no exception to the general rule. His swans had one after the other
proved to be more or less geese even in his own estimation, and he was beginning
almost to think that his mother was a better judge of character than he was; but
I think it may be assumed with some certainty that if Ernest had brought her a
real young swan she would have declared it to be the ugliest and worse goose of
all that she had yet seen.
    At first he had not suspected that his friends were wanted with a view to
Charlotte; it was understood that Charlotte and they might perhaps take a fancy
for one another, and that would be so very nice would it not? But he did not see
that there was any deliberate malice aforethought in the arrangement. Now,
however, that he had woke up to what it all meant he was less inclined to bring
any friend of his to Battersby. It seemed to his silly young mind almost
dishonest to ask your friend to come and see you when all you really mean is
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