There's the compensation, my boy--you contribute to the gaiety of your friends.' Carnaby was a fair example of the well-bred, well-fed Englishman--tall, brawny, limber, not uncomely, with a red neck, a powerful jaw, and a keen eye.

Something more of repose, of self-possession, and a slightly more intellectual brow, would have made him the best type of conquering, civilising Briton.

He came of good family, but had small inheritance; his tongue told of age-long domination; his physique and carriage showed the horseman, the game-stalker, the nomad.

Hugh had never bent over books since the day when he declined the university and got leave to join Colonel Bosworth's exploring party in the Caucasus.
After a boyhood of straitened circumstances, he profited by a skilful stewardship which allowed him to hope for some seven hundred a year; his elder brother, Miles, a fine fellow, who went into the army, pinching himself to benefit Hugh and their sister Ruth.

Miles was now Major Carnaby, active on the North-West Frontier.