"Oh!" said Jolly in the Christ Church meadows, "I had to ask that chap
Val Dartie to dine with us to-night. He wanted to give you lunch and
show you B.N.C., so I thought I'd better; then you needn't go. I don't
like him much."
Holly's rather sallow face had become suffused with pink.
"Why not?"
"Oh! I don't know. He seems to me rather showy and bad form. What are
his people like, Dad? He's only a second cousin, isn't he?"
Jolyon took refuge in a smile.
"Ask Holly," he said; "she saw his uncle."
"I liked Val," Holly answered, staring at the ground before her; "his
uncle looked--awfully different." She stole a glance at Jolly from under
her lashes.
"Did you ever," said Jolyon with whimsical intention, "hear our family
history, my dears? It's quite a fairy tale. The first Jolyon Forsyte--at
all events the first we know anything of, and that would be your
great-great-grandfather--dwelt in the land of Dorset on the edge of the
sea, being by profession an 'agriculturalist,' as your great-aunt put
it, and the son of an agriculturist--farmers, in fact; your grandfather
used to call them, 'Very small beer.'" He looked at Jolly to see how
his lordliness was standing it, and with the other eye noted Holly's
malicious pleasure in the slight drop of her brother's face.
"We may suppose him thick and sturdy, standing for England as it
was before the Industrial Era began. The second Jolyon Forsyte--your
great-grandfather, Jolly; better known as Superior Dosset Forsyte--built
houses, so the chronicle runs, begat ten children, and migrated to
London town. It is known that he drank sherry. We may suppose him
representing the England of Napoleon's wars, and general unrest. The
eldest of his six sons was the third Jolyon, your grandfather, my
dears--tea merchant and chairman of companies, one of the soundest
Englishmen who ever lived--and to me the dearest." Jolyon's voice had
lost its irony, and his son and daughter gazed at him solemnly, "He was
just and tenacious, tender and young at heart. You remember him, and I
remember him. Pass to the others! Your great-uncle James, that's young
Val's grandfather, had a son called Soames--whereby hangs a tale of no
love lost, and I don't think I'll tell it you. James and the other eight
children of 'Superior Dosset,' of whom there are still five alive, may
be said to have represented Victorian England, with its principles of
trade and individualism at five per cent. and your money back--if you
know what that means. At all events they've turned thirty thousand
pounds into a cool million between them in the course of their long
lives. They never did a wild thing--unless it was your great-uncle
Swithin, who I believe was once swindled at thimble-rig, and was called
'Four-in-hand Forsyte' because he drove a pair. Their day is passing,
and their type, not altogether for the advantage of the country.
They were pedestrian, but they too were sound. I am the fourth Jolyon
Forsyte--a poor holder of the name--"