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Alma-Tadema, and some of them liked Mr. Alma-Tadema
better than Lord Leighton. Mildred soon told the ladies of
her romantic marriage with Philip; and he found himself
an object of interest because his family, county people in a
very good position, had cut him off with a shilling because
he married while he was only a stoodent; and Mildred’s fa-
ther, who had a large place down Devonshire way, wouldn’t
do anything for them because she had married Philip. That
was why they had come to a boarding-house and had not a
nurse for the baby; but they had to have two rooms because
they were both used to a good deal of accommodation and
they didn’t care to be cramped. The other visitors also had
explanations of their presence: one of the single gentlemen
generally went to the Metropole for his holiday, but he liked
cheerful company and you couldn’t get that at one of those
expensive hotels; and the old lady with the middle-aged
daughter was having her beautiful house in London done
up and she said to her daughter: ‘Gwennie, my dear, we
must have a cheap holiday this year,’ and so they had come
there, though of course it wasn’t at all the kind of thing they
were used to. Mildred found them all very superior, and she
hated a lot of common, rough people. She liked gentlemen
to be gentlemen in every sense of the word.
‘When people are gentlemen and ladies,’ she said, ‘I like
them to be gentlemen and ladies.’
The remark seemed cryptic to Philip, but when he heard
her say it two or three times to different persons, and found
that it aroused hearty agreement, he came to the conclu-
sion that it was only obscure to his own intelligence. It was