With all their aspirations to the character of typical Englishmen, Mr.
Pendyce and Mr. Barter thought themselves far from the old beef and beer,
port and pigskin types of the Georgian and early Victorian era. They
were men of the world, abreast of the times, who by virtue of a public
school and 'Varsity training had acquired a manner, a knowledge of men
and affairs, a standard of thought on which it had really never been
needful to improve. Both of them, but especially Mr. Pendyce, kept up
with all that was going forward by visiting the Metropolis six or seven
or even eight times a year. On these occasions they rarely took their
wives, having almost always important business in hand--old College,
Church, or Conservative dinners, cricket-matches, Church Congress, the
Gaiety Theatre, and for Mr. Barter the Lyceum. Both, too, belonged to
clubs--the Rector to a comfortable, old-fashioned place where he could
get a rubber without gambling, and Mr. Pendyce to the Temple of things as
they had been, as became a man who, having turned all social problems
over in his mind, had decided that there was no real safety but in the
past.