Stand down." He called up the competing lordling again, and asked: "What was the rank and condition of the great-grandmother who conferred British nobility upon your great house ?" "She was a king's leman and did climb to that splendid eminence by her own unholpen merit from the sewer where she was born." "Ah, this, indeed, is true nobility, this is the right and perfect intermixture.

The lieutenancy is yours, fair lord.

Hold it not in contempt; it is the humble step which will lead to grandeurs more worthy of the splendor of an origin like to thine." I was down in the bottomless pit of humiliation.

I had promised myself an easy and zenith-scouring triumph, and this was the outcome! I was almost ashamed to look my poor disappointed cadet in the face.

I told him to go home and be patient, this wasn't the end.
I had a private audience with the king, and made a proposition.
I said it was quite right to officer that regiment with nobilities, and he couldn't have done a wiser thing.