At the back of national life there was always this problem of individual conduct, especially sexual conduct--without regularity in which, the family, as the unit of national life, was gravely threatened, to put it on the lowest ground.
And he did not see how to bring it home to the villagers that they had got to be regular, without making examples now and then.
He had hoped very much to get through his call without coming across Freeland's wife and children, and was greatly relieved to find Tod, seated on a window-sill in front of his cottage, smoking, and gazing apparently at nothing.

In taking the other corner of the window-sill, the thought passed through his mind that Freeland was really a very fine-looking fellow.

Tod was, indeed, about Malloring's own height of six feet one, with the same fairness and straight build of figure and feature.

But Tod's head was round and massive, his hair crisp and uncut; Malloring's head long and narrow, his hair smooth and close-cropped.
Tod's eyes, blue and deep-set, seemed fixed on the horizon, Malloring's, blue and deep-set, on the nearest thing they could light on.

Tod smiled, as it were, without knowing; Malloring seemed to know what he was smiling at almost too well.