"'
'I don't remember; so I won't pretend to--though I should do so
as a rule.'
She looked at him oddly, and seemed about to laugh, yet did not.
'You have had little experience of the country?' Jasper
continued.
'Very little. You, I think, have known it from childhood?'
'In a sort of way. I was born in Wattleborough, and my people
have always lived here. But I am not very rural in temperament. I
have really no friends here; either they have lost interest in
me, or I in them. What do you think of the girls, my sisters?'
The question, though put with perfect simplicity, was
embarrassing.
'They are tolerably intellectual,' Jasper went on, when he saw
that it would be difficult for her to answer. 'I want to persuade
them to try their hands at literary work of some kind or other.
They give lessons, and both hate it.'
'Would literary work be less--burdensome?' said Marian, without
looking at him.
'Rather more so, you think?'
She hesitated.
'It depends, of course, on--on several things.'
'To be sure,' Jasper agreed. 'I don't think they have any marked
faculty for such work; but as they certainly haven't for
teaching, that doesn't matter.
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