Daniel Touchett saw before him a
life-long residence in his adopted country, of which, from the
first, he took a simple, sane and accommodating view. But, as he
said to himself, he had no intention of dis-americanizing, nor had
he a desire to teach his only son any such subtle art. It had been for
himself so very soluble a problem to live in England assimilated yet
unconverted that it seemed to him equally simple his lawful heir
should after his death carry on the grey old bank in the white
American light. He was at pains to intensify this light, however, by
sending the boy home for his education. Ralph spent several terms at
an American school and took a degree at an American university,
after which, as he struck his father on his return as even redundantly
native, he was placed for some three years in residence at Oxford.
Oxford swallowed up Harvard, and Ralph became at last English
enough. His outward conformity to the manners that surrounded him
was none the less the mask of a mind that greatly enjoyed its
independence, on which nothing long imposed itself, and which,
naturally inclined to adventure and irony, indulged in a boundless
liberty of appreciation.
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