74 MEMOIR OF FLEEMING JENKIN 



differed, and they did so on momentous subjects, 

 they differed with perfect temper and content ; 

 and in the conduct of life, and in depth and dura- 

 bility of love, they were at one. Each full of high 

 spirits, each practised something of the same 

 repression : no sharp word was uttered in their 

 house. The same point of honour ruled them : 

 a guest was sacred and stood within the pale from 

 criticism. It was a house, besides, of unusual 

 intellectual tension. Mrs. Austin remembered, in 

 the early days of the marriage, the three brothers, 

 John, Charles, and Alfred, marching to and fro, 

 each with his hands behind his back, and * reasoning 

 high ' till morning ; and how, like Dr. Johnson, 

 they would cheer their speculations with as many 

 as fifteen cups of tea. And though, before the 

 date of Fleeming's visit, the brothers were separ- 

 ated, Charles long ago retired from the world at 

 Brandeston, and John already near his end in the 

 ' rambling old house ' at Weybridge, Alfred Austin 

 and his wife were still a centre of much intellectual 

 society, and still, as indeed they remained until 

 the last, youthfully alert in mind. There was but 

 one child of the marriage, Anne, and she was her- 

 self something new for the eyes of the young 

 visitor ; brought up, as she had been, like her 

 mother before her, to the standard of a man's 

 acquirements. Only one art had she been denied, 

 she must not learn the violin the thought was too 



