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 To
Arthur Hyatt Williams
and
the late John Derg Sutherland
 CONTENTS

Preface and Acknowledgments XV

Part I
The Origins of Object Relations Theory
1. The Major Trends in Object Relations Theory
and Practice 3
Part II
Sigmund Freud
2. Three Essays on the Theory ofSexuality* 27
3. Mourning and Melancholia* 31
4. The Ego and the Id* 34
Part III
W. R. D. Fairbairn
5. "Schizoid Factors in the Personality"* 43
6. "A Revised Psychopathology of the Psychoses and
Psychoneurosis"* 50
7. "Endopsychic Structure Considered in Terms of
Object Relationships"* 64
8. "Observations on the Nature of Hysterical States"* 78
9. ''The Nature and Aims of Psychoanalytic Treatment"* 98
*excerpt or abridgement
X CONTENTS

Part IV
Melanie Klein
10. ''The Psychoanalytic Play Technique: Its History and
Significance"* 113
11. "Some Theoretical Conclusions Regarding the Emotional Life
of the Infant"* 130
12. "Notes on Some Schizoid Mechanisms"* 136
13. ''The Origins of Transference"* 156
14. "A Study of Envy and Gratitude"* 161

PartV
D. W. Winnicott
15. "Primitive Emotional Development"* 179
16. "Hate in the Countertransference"* 187
17. "Aggression in Relation to Emotional Development"* 194
18. '"'i'ansitional Objects and Transitional Phenomena"* 197
19. "Metapsychological and Clinical Aspects of Regression
within the Psycoanalytical Setup"* 211
20. "Clinical Varieties ofTransference"* 216
21. ''Primary Maternal Preoccupation"* 221
22. ''The Theory of the Parent-Infant Relationship"* 225
23. "Ego Distortion in Terms of True and False Self'* 236
24. ''The Use of an Object and Relating through
Identifications"* 248
25. "Playing: Its Theoretical Status in the Clinical
Situation"* 256
26. ''The Location of Cultural Experience"* 262
27. "Mirror-Role of Mother and Family in Child
Development"* 265
28. Therapeutic Consultations in Child Psychiatry* 271
CONTENTS xi

Part VI
Wilfred Bion
29. Experiences in Groups: "Group Dynamics: A Re-View"* 279
30. Secor.d Thoughts: "The Development of Schizophrenic
Thought" and "Attacks on Linking"* 289
31. Summary of''The Differentiation of the Psychotic from
the Non-Psychotic Personalities (1957) and "A Theory of
Thinking" (1962) 303
32. Learning from Experience "The K-Link"* 306
33. Attention and Interpretation: "Reality Sensuous and
Psychic," "Opacity of Memory and Desire," "Container and
Contained Transformed," "Prelude to or Substitute for
Achievement"* 309
Part VII
Klein's Theory Elaborated
34. Susan Isaacs' ''The Nature and Function of Phantasy"* 321
35. Hanna Segal's "Notes on Symbol Formation"* 332
36. Herbert Rosenfeld's "A Clinical Approach to the
Psychoanalytic Theory of the Life and Death Instincts"* 341
Part VIII
Early Contributions of the Independent Group
37. Michael Balint's The Basic Fault* 353
38. Harry Guntrip's ''The Schizoid Problem, Regression, and the
Struggle to Preserve an Ego"* 366
39. John Bowlby's ''The Role of Attachment in Personality
Development"* 381
Part IX
Transference and Countertransference
40. Paula Heimann's "On Countertransference"* 393
41. Heinrich Racker's ''The Meanings and Uses of
Countertransference"* 400
xii CONTENTS

42. Joseph Sandler's "Countertransference and Role-

Responsiveness"* 406
43. Betty Joseph's "Transference: The Total Situation"* 412

Part X
Advances in Theory
44. John Steiner's "A Theory of Psychic Retreats"* 421
45. Elizabeth Bott Spillius's "Varieties of Envious
Experience"* 427
46. Esther Bick's "The Experience of the Skin in Early Object
Relations" 432
47. Thomas Ogden's "On the Concept of an Autistic-Contiguous
Position"* 438
48. John D. Sutherland's ''The Autonomous Self'* 450

Part XI
Advances in Clinical Concepts
Contributions to the 'Ireatment of Splitting
and Projective Identification
49. James Grotstein's Splitting and Projective Identification* 460
50. Jill Savege Scharff's Projective and lntrojective Identification
and the Use ofthe Therapist:r Self* 465
51. Otto Kernberg's ''Transference and Countertransference
in the Treatment of Borderline Patients"* 471

Advances in Understanding the Role of the Therapist

in Promoting Growth
52. Nina Coltart's" 'Slouching Towards Bethlehem' ...
or Thinking the Unthinkable in Psychoanalysis"* 478
53. Patrick Casement's On Learning from the Patient:
"The Internal Supervisor''* 484
54. Neville Symington's ''The Analyst's Act of Freedom as
Agent of Therapeutic Change"* 488
CONTENTS xiii

The Relational Matrix of Growth and Change

55. Stephen Mitchell's Relational Concepts in Psychoanalysis
and "Contemporary Perspectives on the Self: Toward
an Integration"* 495
56. Christopher Bollas's Forces ofDestiny and Being a
Character: "Psychic Genera"* 500
57. Thomas Ogden's Subjects ofAnalysis* 505
Part XII
Treating Groups, Families, and Institutions
58. Henry Ezriel's "A Psychoanalytic Approach to Group
Treatment"* 511
59. Henry V. Dicks' Marital Tensions: Clinical Studies Towards
a Psychological Theory ofInteraction* 517
60. David E. Scharff and Jill Savege Scharff's Object Relations
Family Therapy* 523
61. Elliott Jaques' "Social Systems as Defence Against
Persecutory and Depressive Anxiety"* 533
Part XIII
Suggestions for Further Reading
Credits 547
Index 557
 Preface and
Acknowledgments

This collection is designed to give the reader a familiarity with the

literature of each of the major contributors to object relations theory and
practice, written in their own words, and to pave the way for the reader to
pursue the areas that are of interest. The book can stand on its own as an
introduction and overview, but I hope that it will lead to further explora-
tion. In the table of contents, the reader will note asterisks indicating
those selections which are excerpts or abridgements from longer works.
The reader who is unfamiliar with this field may be helped by first
reading a book I previously wrote with Jill Savege Scharff, ScharffNotes:
A Primer of Object Relations Therapy (Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson,
1992). This primer is the equivalent of an introductory workshop on the
ideas that are developed by the original contributors in this volume.
However, the comments provided in this book should be an adequate
guide in themselves, so that this volume can stand on its own.
This book grew out of my experience in object relations teaching, first
in the program that I developed at the Washington School of Psychiatry in
1989, in other courses that I have taught over many years, and now full-
time at the International Institute of Object Relations Therapy. Collect-
ing the readings for such programs has always been a problem because
the essential literature is scattered among many journals and books. As I
began to select readings for inclusion here, I realized that these readings,
accompanied by a suitable introductory framework, could provide the
readings for a program in object relations theory and practice.
As always in such endeavors, I owe a considerable debt to teachers and
colleagues who have taught me so much. This includes especially those
xvi PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

many British colleagues who taught me during my time in London many

years ago, and those who worked with my colleagues and me at the
Washington School during my time there, and since then at the IIORT.
Arthur Hyatt Williams, who has taught me so much for more than twenty
years, was perhaps the most doggedly dedicated teacher among this
wonderful group, and I am especially indebted to him. I am also grateful
to my colleagues in the object relations programs at the Washington
School and the IIORT for their encouragement and collaboration, and
especially to Jill Savege Scharff, who has shared in the rewards and
travails of the endeavor throughout. One learns most from students, and I
am grateful to the many students who have persisted in studying and
questioning concepts, and have taught me in the process.
I am also grateful to previous collectors of anthologies or writers of
exegeses whose guidance I have used in part in making this selection,
such as Juliet Mitchell for The Selected Melanie Klein (London: The
Hogarth Press, 1986); Elizabeth Spillius for her account of the develop-
ment of Klein's views and those of her English colleagues and students in
several places, including especially her 1994 article, "Developments in
Kleinian Thought: Overview and Personal View" (Psychoanalytic In-
quiry 14(3). Particularly, I want to thank her for her close reading of
much of my material, and the generosity of her comments on and
contributions to this volume. In some places I have directly acknowl-
edged her help, but there are many areas in which she helped sharpen my
understanding and added immeasurably to the process of representing
the Kleinian tradition. Among other influences are the written guidance
provided by Masud Khan in his introduction to Winnicott's work re-
printed in The Maturational Processes and the Facilitating Environment;
Jock Sutherland, a mentor, for his 1980 article, "The British Object
Relations Theorists: Balint, Winnicott, Fairbairn, Guntrip" (Journal of
the American Psychoanalytic Association 28:829) and Eric Rayner for
his survey of the Independent Tradition in his The Independent Mind in
British Psychoanalysis. (Northvale NJ: Jason Aronson, 1991). But these
are only representatives of my general indebtedness to the many who
have tilled the soil before me and whose influence is surely evident, even
if blended beyond specific recognition.
Finally, I am indebted to those who have specifically and generously
helped in this project: to Jason Aronson, who suggested and supported it,
to Judy Cohen, the editor, who slaved over it with me, to Nancy D'Arrigo,
who designs such fine covers with such cheer. David Thckett was enor-
PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS xvii

mously facilitating in obtaining permission for reprinting from the

various trusts and the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis and the
International Review ofPsycho-Analysis. Ellinor Fairbairn Birtles, Eliz-
abeth Bott Spillius, and Arthur Hyatt Williams also helped generously in
this regard. Jo Parker, Anna Innes, and Zoe Scharff helped with the
details of acquiring and checking resources. My wife Jill Savege Scharff,
as always, stood by with encouragement and support. This has been a
labor of love, but it is a labor that could not have been accomplished
without their loving support and that of many others.

August 25, 1994

Nantucket, Massachusetts
 I

THE ORIGINS OF
OBJECT RELATIONS
THEORY
 1

The Major 'frends in Object

Relations Theory and
Practice

The notion of"object relations" originated with Freud's discussion of the

fate of the sexual instinct, libido, seeking an object or person by which to
be gratified. However, a psychology of object relations that put the
individual's need to relate to others at the center of human development
first achieved prominence in the work of Ronald Fairbairn and Melanie
Klein, who thought that the efforts of each infant to relate to the mother
constituted the first and most important tendency in the baby. Winnicott's
work, which began slightly later, soon became a central part of this
legacy. These three were not alone in their efforts to establish elements of
what has collectively come to be known as "object relations theory," but
their work has continued to constitute the basic framework for the
elaborations of others.

Each of these three major theoreticians is a complex thinker, whose

work is difficult to digest without a teacher or a seminar group. Klein's
writing has always been considered difficult. A native German speaker
without scientific or philosophical training, she wrote descriptively of
her observations and speculations. The writing is at once intuitive and
confusing, but the power of her observation and thinking accumulates
over time, and has come to be perhaps the greatest single force for
psychoanalytic observation since Freud.
Fairbairn's writing is different. He had considerable training in phi-
losophy during his first degree at the University in Edinburgh before he
was a field officer in World War I, and he then went on to medical school.
He is unique among the major contributors to psychoanalytic theory in
4 THE ORIGINS OF OBJECT RELATIONS THEORY

this philosophical background, and in the rigor of his thought, which

stems from the synthesis of philosophy and the scientific method. While
his earliest published papers were full of intense clinical observation, his
recently published early papers and lectures on analytic theory show his
keen and inquiring attempts to make sense of the inconsistencies and
potential strengths of Freud's work (Birdes and Scharff 1994, Scharff and
Birdes 1994). His inquiries reached fruition in the papers written in the
1940s and 1950s, many of which are included in the only book he pub-
lished himself, A Psychoanalytic Study of the Personality (Fairbairn
1952). The writing is a model of tight reasoning, condensed language,
and rigor derived from the adherence to scientific and philosophical prin-
ciples. The theory that emerged in this book, and that was elaborated
upon and explained in later papers, which are now collected for the first
time in Scharff and Birdes (1994), filled out the theory, linked it to the
contemporary concerns of developing psychoanalytic theory, answered
objections, and again considered his early concerns (Birdes and Scharff
1994) about methodological and scientific shortcomings in Freud's theory.
Fairbairn's contribution has emerged as the single most consistent
theory of psychoanalysis we now have, the hub of a wheel to which the
spokes can relate logically to add clinical and theoretical richness to our
understanding. It is not that this theory replaces the others. The human
condition is far too complex for any single theory to suffice. But Fair-
bairn's construction emerges as the most centered, the most logical, and
the most helpful in organizing the others, including not only Klein and
Winnicott, but also such current theories as attachment theory (Bowlby),
self psychology (Kohut), and relational-conflict theory (Mitchell). Fair-
bairn's work also provides links between Freud, drive theory, ego psy-
chology, and the relational theories. I describe some of these links in the
introductions to each part of this book.
Winnicott's background was different. He was a pediatrician who fell
in with a vibrant analytic group in London, but he maintained his
grounding in pediatrics. His definition of his work was strongly influ-
enced by his professional beginnings: the observation of the child,
mother, and family. His writing is grounded in clinical and developmen-
tal observation, always given an idiosyncratic, imaginative twist. This
then suddenly becomes a theory of development written in metaphorical
and evocative language. Not surprisingly, the resulting language is like
quicksilver: beautiful, suggestive, evanescent. Now you follow it, now
you don't! The logical links are not always there, but always there is
DAVID E. SCHARFF

something powerfully and creatively convincing. The best experience of

Winnicott comes with reading his work intuitively while letting go of
logic and understanding, and slowly arriving at understanding from the
inside by experiencing his words, which are powerful, magical, and
confounding. There are some good guides to Winnicott's thought, which
gradually began to build to a theory of development, but the summaries
cannot offer clarity and still retain the magical creative confusion that his
own words offer. Here, I will try to offer both: a bit oflogic mixed in with
a sturdy dose of the original magic.
Winnicott's magic covers the field: the child's coming into being,
creating itself within the intimacies of the relationship with its mother,
the mother's role in the child's development, and the implications of these
observations for assessment and therapy with infants, children, and
adults. His contributions on countertransference are among the most
moving and evocative in the literature. His linking of technique with
adults to what he has learned from dealing with children is original and
valuable, and ranks with the work of Klein and her followers.
Fairbairn, Klein, and Winnicott came to analysis from different
perspectives. I have chosen examples of their writings that highlight the
centrality of each perspective, which gives the beginning reader a start-
ing point. Because of the subtle shifts in their work, each has focused the
analytic spotlight on different aspects of human development, and there-
fore has offered a different set of perspectives and techniques. Because of
the partial nature of each view, they can be criticized. But I find it more
useful to focus on the intense investigation they offer, each from their
particular vantage. Then it is up to us to attempt a working synthesis.

FAIRBAIRN'S MODEL OF THE MIND

Fairbairn began his work with an intense scholarly interest in Freud,

developing a thorough understanding of Freud's theory as demonstrated
in the notes he used in the seminars he taught medical and other students
at the University of Edinburgh (Birtles and Scharff 1994). He ended these
early lectures with a series of questions about Freud's theoretical struc-
ture, questions that he could not fully answer until his own formulation in
the 1940s, when he took up some of the objections from the standpoint of
his new theory. However, he did not fully outline his differences with
Freud and the reasons for them until the series of late papers (Scharff and
6 THE ORIGINS OF OBJECT RELATIONS THEORY

Birtles 1994). In his clinical reports written as early as 1927 (Fairbairn

1927), he considered the relationship of the patient to the family and
others to be the central clinical matter, but he lacked a theoretical
framework that differentiated such a perspective from the standard Freu-
dian point of view.
Fairbairn followed the London scene and the work of Melanie Klein
and her group closely, and was profoundly influenced by them, since
their emphasis on the experience of the infant in relating to the mother
fit well with his own ideas. However, he did not accept Klein's ideas
without question. One can see him incorporate many of her ideas as his
writing progresses, most notably in two papers he wrote on a psychology
of art (Fairbairn 1936a, b) where the ideas represent an early, uncritical
application of Klein's ideas of relating to the object, symbolism, and
symbolic repair.
In his first original theoretical paper, written a few years after the
papers on a psychology of art, the 1940 paper "Schizoid Factors in the
Personality" (excerpted in Chapter 5), Fairbairn outlined the process of
splitting of the ego in normal development and pathology. He amended
Klein's early postulates of development, suggesting that splitting of the
object and ego constituted an earlier position than the "depressive posi-
tion" she had described as the infant's recognition of the mother as a
whole person. She had, in the meantime, described the ''paranoid posi-
tion," involving early processes of projection of aggression. She now
agreed with Fairbairn, and renamed this earlier position the ''paranoid-
schizoid position," to arrive at a description of an early position the infant
takes in regard to its object that is characterized by the pairing of splitting
and projection. Thus, for both theorists, splitting of the object came to
represent an early and fundamental psychic defense against pain in
relationships. Nevertheless, we can see the different emphasis already
emerging in Fairbairn's work. Klein emphasized the infant's role in
projection and splitting of the object. She thought the infant mainly tried
to get unpleasant experience and affect outside the self by locating it in
the mother. Fairbairn thought that the effect was to split the ego-or as we
would now call it, the self-accompanied by repression, that is, dispos-
ing of unpleasant internalized relationships by splitting them off from the
main core of the self and burying them. While for both theorists splitting
of both object and ego is involved, the emphasis on ego or object says a
good deal about each one's focus. Aspects of this interaction are men-
tioned in some of the papers excerpted in this volume.
Discovering Diverse Content Through
Random Scribd Documents
entertainment, and would have been unable to get any help in laying
out her table but Cherry's if Marilda had not come in to see what
was going on, thrown herself into the business with zeal and
promptitude, sent back to Centry for a supply of flowers, knives and
forks, and done the work of half a dozen parlour-maids. Stella was
obediently keeping Theodore out of mischief; and the other two girls
were, with Bill Harewood, assisting a select party in decorating the
town hall with evergreens; and Clement, who had to his dismay
found a whole part made over to him by a young Bruce, who had an
inopportune cold, was practising hard at the old piano (which, by-
the-by, Lance had learned to tune); Mr. Flowerdew and the manager
were catching the doubtful and putting them through their
performances; and little Lightfoot was only preserved by his natural
stolidity from utter distraction among the hundred different ways he
was ordered at once. As for Lance, he tried to help every one, was
too excited to keep at anything, and was usually scolded off from
whatever he attempted till at last he shut himself up in the barrack
with his violin, and practised till he was so desperate at the sense of
his failures, that when Bill Harewood came in search of him, he was,
as he mildly expressed it, hesitating whether to hang himself like
Dirk Hatteraick on the beam.
'Well, come down, here's Miles as savage as a bear with a sore head
—vows that he was very near turning back again when he saw your
rose-coloured placard of the Zoraya at the station.'
'If he's sulky, that is a go!' exclaimed Lance, with a look of
consternation, utterly overpowering his stage fright. 'Do you
remember his putting us all out at the Deanery, because Miss Evans
affronted him?'
'Well do I remember it! He boxed my ears for it so that they sung for
a week!'
And the two ex-choristers went down, feeling much as when an
anthem had gone wrong. The room was pretty well filled with their
old comrades, but Lance only went from one to the other quietly
shaking hands, and quaking for the future as he heard the organist
thundering away to Wilmet and Cherry.
He hated singing women some degrees more than the rest of their
sex, and above all Italian singing women, who never appreciated
Handel. Cherry ventured to suggest that the lady was not Italian,
but, if anything, Hungarian.
'Madam,' he answered in Johnsonian wrath, 'she is cosmopolitan,
that is to say a half breed or quarter breed of everything, with
neither home, nation, nor faith!'
'Do you know anything against her?' gravely asked Wilmet, with a
view to the possible contingency of being desired to call upon her.
'I know enough in knowing her to be a second-rate prima donna.
Faugh! Now and then comes a first-rate one who can't help it, and is
as meek and simple as you might be; but when this sort of woman
comes down as a favour, I know what that means! Who is to pay the
debt you'll have?'
'They come for their expenses.'
He held up his hands. 'I'd ten times rather she came at a hundred
guineas a night! Then you'd know what to be at! Whose doing is it?'
'My brother Edgar's.'
'Then I hope he is prepared to pay for it. That is, if she comes at all.
You'll have a telegram to say she has a cold, and who is to announce
it to an indignant audience?'
'I think you had better, Mr. Miles,' said Cherry daringly, 'for you will
congratulate them upon it.'
'Isn't his face a caution?' whispered Bill to Lance. 'He never got such
sauce before.'
'He likes it,' returned Lance, triumphantly rubbing his hands. 'Cherry
could come over Pluto himself!'
And in effect, the lively gracious tongue of the one sister, and the
calm beauty of the other, were producing a wonderful placability and
good-humour; the lads who were feeding by relays in the back room
ventured to talk and laugh above their breath, and the only fear was
of a relapse when Marilda's carriage, with Mr. and Mrs. Spooner in it,
called for Cherry, and the fascination had to be removed.
Lance was as much delighted to walk down with the choir, though he
sorely missed his cap and gown, as was Will to go, as he said, like a
gentleman, the only one except little Bernard available to escort the
ladies. Robin was quite content, as he took to himself all the honour
and glory of representing his brother, and giving an arm to the belle
of the room, as he persisted in declaring Wilmet, though to well
accustomed Bexley eyes, she was much more likely to appear as the
school teacher.
They were a merry little snug party, those four sisters behind, with
the three Harewoods; only Wilmet was rather scandalised by the
titter of Grace and Lucy in their delight at being relieved from Mr.
Miles's presence; and their excitement about Edgar, whom they
viewed as the most beautiful vision that had ever dawned on them.
Vain were Wilmet's endeavours to keep them in order by stern
repressions of her own comparatively unoffending sisters, who had
little attention to spare for nonsense, since Robina's whole soul was
set on Lance's enjoying and distinguishing himself, and Angela was
in an absolutely painful state of tension with expectation and anxiety
for the star's appearance and Mr. Miles's temper.
Presently, after long waiting, there was a look of sensation and
eagerness, and Felix, who had been detained to the last moment,
came edging himself through the lines of chairs, his whiskers in their
best curl, and his hair shining, to exchange a word with his
outermost sister, who chanced to be Robin.
'All right, if the train is not late. Edgar has telegraphed. Is Cherry
comfortable? I couldn't get away before. There's not a ticket left.'
Happy those that caught the whisper as Felix made his way up the
lane, and was admitted through the orchestra; but there was still
delay enough to allow some impatient stamping of feet to begin
before the revolution in the programme could be settled which was
to give these erratic meteors time to appear. Then at last came the
overture, and the concert took its course. There was no doubt that
Mr. Miles was accompanying in his best style; Angela was soon far
too blissful for personal anxieties; but it was a great comfort to the
sisters to be secure that all was right, when not only the three
brothers—of whom they had seen and heard their share in the
sacred part—but Edgar came forward. Any sisters might be proud of
four such brothers—so bright, so straight, so strong and fair; Edgar,
with his fine robust figure and silky beard, giving them altogether a
distinguished look and character, though Clement's head was a little
the highest, and Lance's voice was the sweetest and most
remarkable in power and expression; but all were in wonderful
accord and harmony. Any other audience would have encored the
performance as something rare and exquisite; but the Underwood
brothers and their glees were rather stock pieces at Bexley, and
people wanted something new.
Lance's performance with the Miss Birkets was very correct, but not
of the style calculated to produce any very lively sentiments among
the uninitiated audience, who were on the tip-toe of expectation of
the lady whose arrival had been notified in whispers, and hardly fully
appreciating the best that either their own powers or the
Minsterham choir could produce. The first part went by without her;
and in the interval came hope in the shape of Lance, who made an
incursion to ask his sisters how they liked it, and to impart that the
Zoraya was safe come, but was supposed to be dressing. 'Mr. Miles
said she would be dressing till midnight, and would be less worth
hearing then than a decently trained choir-boy. But he's not sulky,
after all; yet,' added Lance, with a look of brightness in his face,
'fancy his telling Fee that I played that remarkably well just now—
truth and taste, he said—the old villain—only that the ladies would
spoil my time if I didn't take care. And there's a sallow-faced fellow
come down with Mademoiselle, who said it wasn't bad either!'
No wonder Lance was exalted; and he required equal admiration for
all his favourites, until he had to hurry back again.
A little of what seemed to the excited commonplace—then came the
event of the evening. The glistening silken lady, with a flashing
emerald spray in her dark hair, lustrous eyes of a colour respecting
which no two persons in the room agreed, and a face of brilliant
beauty, was led bowing forward, and her notes, birdlike, fresh, and
clear, rang through the room, her brother accompanying her. It was
a strong clear voice, and the language and air being alike new,
entranced every one; the applause was vehement, the encoring
almost passionate; but the lady would not be encored, she gave
them two songs alone, one with her brother, accompanied this time
by Lance's 'sallow-faced fellow;' and though she smiled and curtsied
graciously, was not to be induced to repeat herself.
It seemed to Robina as if the lady herself and the whole public had
taken a great deal of trouble for a very brief matter; but she found it
was rank treason to say so, when at the conclusion of the whole,
those faithful brothers hurried down each to pick up a sister and
bestow her safely at home before repairing to the Fortinbras Arms
for the great supper to the Minsterham choir. The Bexley public had
been favoured beyond all desert or reason; the newness of the airs
had been a perfect revelation to Lance's ears, and he was very angry
with Clement for being disappointed, and repeating Mr. Miles's
judgment that there was lack both of science in the singing and of
sweetness in the voice.
Altogether the evening had been a great success; every one was
delighted with every one else, and the supper was not the least
charming part, preceded as it was by Lance's bringing the little
seven years old choir boy, half asleep, ready to cry and quite worn
out, and putting him under Wilmet's care. He had half his night's
rest out on the sofa before he was picked up in the kindly arms of
the big bass and carried off to the mail train. Lance seemed much
disposed to go with them by mistake; indeed, he was only withheld
from accompanying them to the station by Felix reminding him
rather sharply that someone must be kept sitting up for him.
It was over, and the morning began with Felix standing straight up in
the office, master now rather than brother, and gravely saying, 'Now,
Lance, that this excitement is at an end, I shall expect attention and
punctuality, and shall excuse no more neglects. Take this invoice,
and overlook the unpacking of those goods.'
'Yes, sir.' Lance wriggled his shoulders feeling intensely weary of
such tasks; and as he stood, paper in hand, still he partly whistled,
partly hummed the Hungarian air, till the foreman came out of the
printing-house, saying, 'Mr. Lancelot, I should be much obliged if you
would desist. It distracts the young men.'
Of course Lance bothered the young men, but desisted whenever he
recollected it, and then inly bemoaned the having passed a light-
house of anticipation, and having before him only a dreary irksome
twilight waste.
Edgar had not been seen that morning, except to leave word that he
meant to breakfast with his friends at the Fortinbras Arms; but at
the dinner hour he looked into the office, and saying, 'You are at
liberty, Lance, I want you,' carried him off, Felix knew not why nor
where, and had no time to ask, even when Lance came back, and
this was not till past two, with the shop overflowing, and customers
waiting to be attended to. It was one of those times when gossipry
was rife, and the master had to stand talking, talking, while his
assistants had more than enough on their hands with the real
purchasers, a division of labour that usually came naturally, but to
which Lance was evidently not conforming himself as usual; and at
last Felix heard him absolutely denying that certain blotting-blocks
ever had been, would, or could be made, and had to turn hastily to
the rescue and undertake that they should be forthcoming by the
next week. Also two orders proved to have been left not entered,
and therefore not attended to, and Felix was thoroughly roused into
vexation and anger. As soon as the last hurried customers had come
and gone, while Stubbs and Lightfoot were closing the shutters, he
again summoned Lance with, 'This will not do, Lance. Your ignorance
and laziness are not to be the limit of people's wants, and I will not
have my customers neglected. I have had patience with you all
through this business, and that good fellow Lamb has shown
forbearance that amazes me, but it must go on no longer. Things
cannot be done by halves. Either you must turn over a new leaf, and
give your mind to the business, or you must give it up, and look out
for some other employment.'
'You wish me to give it up?' mumbled Lance, in a voice that sounded
sullen.
'You are going the way to make me do so.'
'You don't want me? Very well.'
'Stay, Lance,' said Felix, whose reproofs had never before been
received by Lance in this manner, 'I wish you to understand. You
offered your services under a generous impulse last year, when I
was overdone and perplexed; but I doubted then if it were not a
mistake. You had come to be very valuable, more so than any mere
hireling could be, and I am very thankful to you; but if you are to be
like what you have been for a month past, you are doing some harm
to the business and a great deal to yourself; and you had better
choose some line that you can be hearty in.'
'Could you afford it, Felix?'
'I must afford it! Such work as yours has been of late is the most
expensive of all. Eh!' rather startled; 'have you anything in your
head?'
'I hardly know.'
A message came in at the moment, and by the time Felix had
answered it, Lance had vanished, rather to his vexation and
uneasiness. He went up to supper, the first family meeting where
there had been time to talk over the humours of the day before.
Edgar was full of fun; and the report Cherry had been writing for the
Pursuivant was read aloud in the family conclave, and freely
canvassed, but Lance, though he put in a word or two here and
there, was much quieter than usual; and when all the others moved
back into the drawing-room, he touched Robina's arm, and kept her
with him in the dark room.
'What should you say, Bob, if I got out of it all?' was his first word.
'Out of it all!'
'Ay. Felix thinks me no loss, and I've got a chance.'
'Oh!' a long interrogative not well pleased sound it was, not
answered at once; and Robina added, 'Does Mr. Miles want an
assistant?'
''Tisn't that sort. You saw the gentleman that came down with Edgar
and the Hungarians?'
'Yes, his name is Allen, he is manager of the National Minstrelsy,'
Edgar said.
'Just so. He has got a lease of a concert-room in town, and he would
give me five pounds a week to sing two nights a week through the
season!'
'Lance!' Robina could only stand breathless.
'I'll tell you all about it. You know Edgar came and called me just at
dinner-time.'
'I know, and Felix got no dinner at all except a sandwich that Wilmet
sent down.'
'Well, that was his own fault. However, there they were at the
Fortinbras Arms, in the best blue room, just come down to
breakfast.'
'Who? The Hungarians?'
'Yes. Mr. Allen and M. Prebel were waiting for the lady, to ring and
have the hot things up. What a stunner she is, to be sure! the finest
woman I ever saw in my life, and such pretty ways when she can't
find an English word, I should think a queen must be just like her.'
'Yes, if she is waited for in that way. Did you get anything to eat,
then, Lance?'
'Didn't we, though? Why, they had asked us to breakfast; and such a
breakfast I never set eyes on—devilled kidneys, and pie with truffles
in it, and pine-apple jam—and wine! They asked for wines that Reid
the waiter had never heard of—nor, it is my belief, Mr. Jones either.'
'But is this all to come out of their expenses that are paid for them?'
'You're getting like W.W., I declare, Bobbie. I never thought of that;
but I'll go up to Reid, and find out the worth of my own share, and
wipe that out. Well, they were uncommonly kind and civil. Edgar's
quite at home with them, you know; talks French like a house on
fire, or German—I don't know which it was, but she made it sound
as pretty as could be, and I should soon pick it up. I had no notion
what they were at, but Edgar said she wanted to hear me sing that
song of Sullivan's again, and I could not help doing it; and then she
smiled and bowed and thanked, and Mr. Allen made remarks, about
my wanting lightness and style, said it came of singing too much
cathedral music.'
'O Lance, wasn't that like the Little Master saying Montjoie St.
Denis?'
'Nonsense! He's no more like the Little Master than you are; Edgar
says he's as respectable as Old Time, and has got a little mouse of a
wife as good as gold. But he does want a high tenor to sing his
English ballads, and he'll give me this, with chances to sing at
private concerts, and opportunities of getting lessons on the violin.
Think of that, you solemn bird, you.'
'Where would you live?'
'With Edgar. Then I could make up the difference to Fee; and what I
could save, with Edgar's picture, will take us to Italy. And there I
could get finished up first-rate.'
'You've not settled it so?'
'Why, no. The first thing that struck me was that it was awfully cool
by Felix, to say all this without notice to him, and I told them as
much; but then they said they didn't want to inconvenience Felix,
and wouldn't want me till March.'
'Just as if you were his servant.'
'In that light, so I am.'
'You don't really think of doing it, Lance?'
'I don't mean one thing or the other yet, Robin! Here's Felix one side
telling us that he's very much obliged to me, but I am worse than no
use at all; and Edgar and this Allen on the other, saying that here's
the line that I am cut out for.'
'But Felix can only mean when you are gone mad after the concert.'
'And who is to help getting mad, when their life is all dulness and
botheration? Edgar told me it would be so—and now Felix himself
declares it was a mistake my ever working here.'
'Felix must have been terribly displeased, to say so.'
'I believe he was indeed! but I couldn't help it. How can one mind
foolscap and satin wove, and all the rest of it, when there are such
glorious things beyond?'
'O Lance, I never heard you say "couldn't help it" before!'
'Now, Robin, say in three words. Do you want me to be a mere
counter-jumper all my life?'
'O Lance—don't.'
'There, you see what you really feel about it. Now—without coming
to such a point as Sims Reeves, or Joachim, or—' (and Lance's face
was full of infinite possibility), 'I could with the most ordinary luck
get up high enough to have a handsome maintenance; and at any
rate, I should live with what is life to me—have time to study the
science—be a composer, maybe—and get into a society that is not
all inferior. I hate the isolation we live in here—not a real lady out of
one's own family to be friendly with one.'
'But I don't think ladies are so with musical people.'
'Maybe not, but they are a strong, cultivated, refined society of their
own, able to take care of themselves. What now, Robin, can't you
speak? What is it now?'
'I was only thinking of what you said last time Edgar asked you.'
'I hadn't seen London then, I knew nothing about it. The very
Sundays there are different things from what they are in this deadly
lively place.'
'That's as you make them. Besides, that makes no difference as to
that other thing you said.'
'What?' (A little crossly.)
'About the cathedral and the stage,' whispered Robina, hanging her
head.
'One doesn't want all that one ever said when one was a high-flown
ass to be thrown in one's teeth,' said Lance, angrily.
'Oh!' but otherwise Robina held her tongue.
Presently Lance began again persuasively. 'You see this is only
training, after all, Bobbie; I may take to sacred music, oratorios or
anything else, when once I have got thoroughly taught; and I can
only do that by living on my own voice. I must lay by enough to take
me to Italy, and when I have learnt there, then I can turn to
anything.'
'Do you think you ever would lay by?'
That was rather a cutting question, for Lance, though never in debt,
never could keep a sixpence in his pocket.
'I could if I had a real object.'
'Only I don't think it would wholly depend on yourself,' said sensible
Robina. 'I suppose they don't pay by the week; and then if the
concern should not answer?
'That's sheer impossibility. There isn't a safer man in London than
Allen. It is a much more profitable investment than old Pur.'
'Then if you lived with Edgar, you don't know how much you might
have to go shares for.'
Thereupon Lance broke out into absolute anger against Robina for
her unkindness to Edgar, talking much of the want of charity of
people who lived at home, and thought everything beyond their ken
must be wicked. She ventured to ask what Felix thought of it, and
was told in return that Felix was not only not his father, but though
the best fellow in the world, had no more knowledge of it than a
child in petticoats. It was for the good of Felix, and everyone else,
that they should not all hang about at home in the stodge and mire.
How long this might have gone on there is no saying, but Felix's
voice was heard calling to them in preparation for evening prayers.
When Robina heard Lance's voice rise in all its sweetness in the
Evening Hymn, her heart was so full of yearning pain and
disappointment, that she could hardly hold back her tears till she
could kneel and hide her face in her hands.
She had this comfort. She did not understand from Lance that he
had accepted, and he certainly did not join Edgar that night in the
kitchen, but, saying he was tired out, he went at once to bed.
On Saturday she had not one private moment with him, but on the
other hand, neither she hoped had Edgar; for the work both of the
press and of the shop happened to be unusually heavy, and neither
he nor Felix had a moment to spare; and Edgar spent the evening
with some friends in the town.
Sunday afternoon, the family hour for walks and talks, poured with
rain, and thereby was favourable to letters to Fulbert. Indeed,
Angela's commencement of some sacred music was stopped, by the
general voice entreating her to wait till the letters were finished.
Lance, who never wrote to anybody but Fulbert, had resumed the
practice ever since he had received an affectionate letter called forth
by his illness, and was now busy with his little blotty portfolio; while
Robina, having no Sunday correspondent, was half reading, half
watching Stella explaining pictures to Theodore.
Presently Lance stretched across, and silently put a sheet of note-
paper into her lap, hushing her by a sign. It had been begun in his
best hand, and it must be confessed that that hand was at present a
scratchy one, and there were various erasures.

DEAR SIR,
I have done my best to consider your kind and flattering
proposal, and have come to the conclusion that for the present
it will be better for me to continue where I am. There will thus
be no need to apply to my eldest brother.
With my respectful thanks,
Yours faithfully,
LANCELOT O.
UNDERWOOD.

Robina made a little pantomime of clapping her hands, for which

Lance did not appear to thank her, but still in dumb show required
her judgment on the choice of several words. She mutely marked
her preference, and he returned to his place and copied it. Still he
had not addressed the letter. He put it into his pocket, with a
significant smile at his sister. Evening came, late service, supper; still
it was in his pocket till the moment of bed-time, and then it was that
Robina saw him linger with Edgar, and went to her room with a
heart full of trembling prayer.
'Edgar,' as his brother arrived in the kitchen, and prepared his pipe,
'how shall I address this?'
'Eh! you needn't be in too great a haste. We had better break it to
poor old Blunderbore first.'
'There's no breaking in the case. I'm not going.'
'Ah! I knew how it would be when you began running about to all
the womankind in the house.'
'I've not spoken to a soul but Bobbie,' said Lance rather hotly, as
Edgar laughed.
'Then one was enough to do your business?'
'I only spoke to her to clear my own mind.'
'Ay, to get someone to contemplate Hercules between Vice and
Virtue; but it won't do, my boy. Little Allen is as virtuous as Felix
himself, and the choice is simply between the thing you can do and
the thing you can't.'
'I can do my duty here,' said Lance bluntly.
'You've tried, my boy; you made a gallant effort, and I let you alone
while you had a head to be spared, but 'tis no good trying to force
the course of the stream, and you had better break loose, before
you get too old for the real thing that you are made for.'
'No, Edgar, I've thought it over, and found out how things stand.
Here will Felix begin now to have more on his hands, and can
manage to shell out less than ever while he had Froggy to fall back
on. Now, not only is my nominal salary much less than he could offer
a stranger, but half of it goes back into the housekeeping, while I'm
done for at home, and I don't see how he could meet the difference
just now.'
'Whew! that's the blind way you all go on, putting the present before
the future. If Felix had a grain of spirit, he would revolt at preying on
your flesh and blood. Flesh and blood—why, its genius and spirit
crushed up in this hole!'
'It is no more than all of us have done by him, ever since he was of
my size.'
'But it is so short-sighted, Lance. You could make it up to him so
soon. Five pounds for certain the week—and possibilities, remember.
You'll lodge with me—that's nothing; and for the rest, you'll soon live
as we do—like the birds of the air.'
'I couldn't make it up to him, and save for Italy; besides I should be
earning nothing there.'
'But I should! Copying is a certain trade. Come now, Lance, you've
taken some panic. Tell me what is at the bottom of it! Have they
been warning you against us wicked Bohemians?'
'They? Nonsense!'
'She, then?'
'It is nothing at all that Robina said.'
'Come, make a clean breast. What lies at the bottom of this absurd
rejection of the best offer you'll ever have in your life?'
Edgar took the pipe out of his mouth, that the smoke might not
obscure his view of the young face whose brow was resting on an
arm leant on the mantel-piece, and the eyes far away. 'What's the
bugbear? and I'll clear it up.'
'No bugbear.'
'You don't trust me. Eh? Is that it? Have they told you I mean to
prey on your innocence?'
'No, indeed, Edgar!'
'Are you afraid of the great and wicked world? I thought you'd more
spirit than that; and I've always told you, you might run after as
many churches as you chose. I'd never hinder you. Come, have it
out, Lance, you think me a corrupter of your artless youth?'
'No!'
'Come, out with it. What has turned you?'
The answer came at last in his low clear voice, speaking more into
the fire than to Edgar, the eyes still fixed and far away—'"And here
we offer and present unto Thee ourselves, our souls and bodies, to
be a reasonable, holy, and lively sacrifice."'
'What do you mean? what's that?' said Edgar, half startled, half
angry.
'It comes after the Holy Communion,' said Lance, quite as much
shocked by the novelty with which the familiar sound struck on his
brother's ears.
'Oh! a pious utterance that only a tête exaltée takes literally.'
'I should not join in it if I didn't mean it,' muttered Lance, in the
most brief matter-of-fact way.
'Then why aren't you living barefoot on bread and water in a
hermitage?'
'Because that's not my duty. It would not be reasonable.'
'There's great force in that word,' began Edgar, with a little scoff in
his tone, but altering it into one of more earnestness. 'Now, Lance, I
want to understand your point of view. How does that formula
hinder you?'
'Because,' said Lance, much against his will, 'it wouldn't be making
my soul and body a reasonable sacrifice, to turn the training I had
for God's praise into singing love songs to get money and fame.'
'Why do you assume that beauty and delight of any sort is not just
as pleasing to God as your chants and anthems?'
'No. One is offered to Him, the other is mere entertainment.'
'So is the first to most folks. Now, you boy, honestly, do you mean
that it is not much of a muchness with sacred and profane, so far as
motive goes?'
'It is what I am always trying that it should be,' said Lance.
'Only trying?'
'Only trying.'
'And you consider yourself to be this sacrifice, this victim, by singing
in a surplice for ladies to whisper about, instead of getting trained to
interpret—nay, what I do say! maybe, compose—the grandest
human music. You've got it in you, my boy.'
'You may say what you please,' said Lance, turning away to the fire.
'I don't want to vex you, boy, I only want to make it out. I see the
sacrifice.'
'It was my own fault for saying a word about it to you,' muttered
Lance.
'But I don't see the sense of it,' proceeded Edgar, 'or what it is but
your own fancy that puts the one thing up in the heights, the other
down in the depths.'
'You must know that,' said Lance, 'the fever and transport that
comes of one kind of music has nothing good in it.'
'That's the question.'
'I know it has not for me.'
'And has the other?'
'Of course it has! Besides, I don't do it for myself. Come, Edgar, tell
me how to direct that letter, and let me go.'
'You may leave it till I go to town.'
'That would not be fair. He will want to look out for someone else.
Tell me!'
'Not I! I'm not going to let you make a fool of yourself in a fit of
religious excitement.'
Lance smiled. 'Much excitement in a cold dark church in a wet
morning, with not twenty people there.'
'That's as you work yourself up. Here, sit down and take the other
pipe.'
'I can't; I can hardly stand yours, my head is raging!'
'Oh! that accounts for it! Go off to bed, and wake in week-day
senses.'
'I wish you'd let me have done with it,' sighed Lance; but Edgar
shook his head with, 'All for your good, my dear fellow!'
'If Balak's messengers will stay the night, it is not my doing,' said
Lance to himself, as he wearily mounted the stairs to his sleepless
bed in the barrack; for though his headaches had become much less
frequent and disabling, still his constitution was so sensitive, that a
course of disturbed nights always followed any excitement; and thus
the morrow found him dull and confused enough to render his
attempts at diligence so far from successful, that he was more than
once sharply called to order; and Felix came in at dinner-time,
exclaiming, 'I can't think what's the matter with that boy. He seems
as if he would never do any good again!'
'Précisément!' muttered Edgar. 'You had better give him up with a
good grace, as I told you before.'
And being at the moment alone in the room with Felix and
Geraldine, he not only detailed his plans for Lance, but eagerly
counselled Felix to invest at least half Thomas Underwood's legacy in
the National Minstrelsy.
'Really!' said Felix, in a tone of irony, 'this is nearly coming to the old
plan of setting up a family circus! Then it is this that has so entirely
unsettled him?'
'That the old must pass away is not sufficiently appreciated here.'
Then Edgar appealed to Cherry for the charms of artist society, and
the confutation of the delusions respecting it held by Philistines at
home, a conversation only interrupted by the arrival of dinner, and
the rest of the population.
Felix as usual had to go down after a few mouthfuls; Edgar followed
him to say on the stairs, 'I've one piece of advice to give. Remember
that you are an old Philistine giant, and act with due humility.'
'Is he set upon it?'
'I cannot say heart and soul, for heart and what he thinks soul are
pulling opposite ways. I say, Felix, you should take into consideration
the effect on me. I haven't sat still to listen to so much piety since
my father's time; it is a caution to see a little chap so simply literal.'
Felix could wait no longer. He found Lance alone in the office, resting
his head on his desk. 'You'll be in time for dinner, Lance!'
'Thank you, I'd rather not. Send Stubbs home.'
'Head-ache?'
'Not much now!'
'I'm sorry I was sharp with you this morning, Lance. You should
have told me!'
'It was not worth while, but I did mean to have done better to-day,
Felix!'
'I believe you did. If you think it will set you to rights, I would let
you off this afternoon.'
'No, thank you; it is getting better.'
Felix looked at him a moment or two, then said, 'Edgar tells me he
has been talking to you.'
'Yes. I hope you have given him a settler, Felix.'
'Have you?'
'I tried, but he would not take it. He thought it was only Sunday.'
'Only Sunday!'
'That made me sure it would not do.'
'You are quite right, Lance. So far as it depends on me, I should
have done all in my power to keep you from what cannot but be a
life of much temptation, and I am thankful that you have decided it
for yourself. You are really content to stay here with me?'
'Content—well, not just now; but I shall be again when all the
remains of the bear-fight have subsided,' said Lance. 'I ought and I
must, and that's enough.'
With which words he ran out as some one was heard entering the
shop; and Felix stood for a few moments over the fire, musing on
the brave way in which his young brother had met the enticement,
and on the danger into which his own reproofs, however well-
merited, had driven him.
Lance's other occupation that evening did not make him better
pleased with Edgar's friends. Wilmet had decreed—and he had
submitted half ruefully, half-merrily—that what remained of his
salary after his contribution to the house expenses, should be
guarded by her for his wardrobe, only half-a-crown a week being put
into his own hands; and as this always managed to disappear
without much to show for it, she viewed it as quite enough for
waste; and indeed, out of what was in her keeping she had
managed to provide him with a watch.
With his Monday half-crown, and sixpence besides, he repaired to
the Fortinbras Arms to pay for his share of the notable breakfast; but
he found some demur; Mr. Jones was aghast at his own bill, and
really unwilling to send it in. The private supper, the next day's
breakfast, and all that the party had called for, amounted to what
would make a terrible hole in the receipts of the concert.
As to Lance's paying the fifth part of the déjeûner, the landlord
thought it was impossible, and though his three shillings might
perhaps represent the cost of what he had individually consumed, to
offer or accept that was not according to rules. Mr. Jones would
gladly have made this bill his subscription to the organ, if he could
but have afforded the loss; but this, as he told Lance, he could not
do. He listened, however, with a smile of some pity, when Lance
assured him that his own and his brother's shares should be made
up; and Lance picked out the charge, and carried it off to Edgar.
There again he met with no success. Edgar laughed at him, and told
him he did not know the privileges of the artiste; and when Lance
waxed hot, and declared that if the concert paid the expenses of the
two stars themselves, it was a wicked exaction to make it defray the
expenses of either Mr. Allen or their guests, he was answered coolly
that expensive articles must be taken on their own terms, and that
spoiling the Philistines was always fair.
'Then don't you mean to pay, Edgar?'
Edgar gave his foreign shrug, and made a gesture of incapability. He
was vexed with Lance, and at no pains to soften matters.
'Now,' said Lance, with a sort of grave simplicity, 'I understand what
living like birds of the air means.'
Lance went back to Mr. Jones, and told him that the two-fifths of the
breakfast should be paid. And in twelve weeks it was done, But by
this specimen it may be guessed that the new organ was not exactly
purchased by the concert.

CHAPTER XXIX.

BRYNHILD.

'Oft with anxious straining eyes

We watch the coming of some joy long
hoped for;
And now 'tis near. But at its side a dark
And stealthy thing, that we should fly like
death
Did we but see it, is advancing on us,
Yes, step by step with those of its bright
compeer.'
King Henry II., a Drama.
(Quoted in Helps' Casimir
Maremma.)
'Which is to have the precedence, Alda's child or ours?'
'Alda's child is not likely to be ready for inspection as early as ours.'
'Oh! I thought you would vote it treason to babydom not to begin
with Lowndes Square.'
'My maternal feelings draw me the other way, you see.'
'You won't confess it to Wilmet!'
'It is of no use to go to Alda before twelve,' put in Marilda. 'Cherry
had better go to the Royal Academy before it gets full.'
It was May, and the catalogue of the Royal Academy bore—

and a good way further on, among the water-colours,

'But abruptly turning,
Hied he to the choir,
Touched the Altar tapers
With a flake of fire.'
(The Three Crowns.)
So, these having been accepted, Geraldine had come up to town to
see them in their place. The undertaking was far less formidable
than it had been a year ago, for Cherry was now much more at
home with her cousins.
She understood Marilda better now, and reproached herself for
having taken for worldliness what was really acquiescence rather
than cause any disturbance in the family such as could worry her
father, of whose state she had been aware all that last summer.
Cherry respected her now, though they had little in common. Marilda
had become too much acclimatized to London to like country life.
She made some awkward attempts at squiress duty, but was far
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