He looked every inch a soldier, yet there were people
who considered that he had missed his vocation in not becoming a
parson. He took a public interest in the spiritual life of the army.
Other persons still, on closer observation, would have felt that his
most appropriate field was neither the army nor the church, but
simply the world--the social, successful, worldly world. If he had a
sword in one hand and a Bible in the other he had a Court Guide
concealed somewhere about his person. His profile was hard and
handsome, his eyes were both cold and kind, his dark straight hair
was imperturbably smooth and prematurely streaked with grey. There
was nothing in existence that he didn't take seriously. He had a
first-rate power of work and an ambition as minutely organised as a
German plan of invasion. His only real recreation was to go to
church, but he went to parties when he had time. If he was in love
with Rose Tramore this was distracting to him only in the same sense
as his religion, and it was included in that department of his
extremely sub-divided life. His religion indeed was of an
encroaching, annexing sort. Seen from in front he looked diffident
and blank, but he was capable of exposing himself in a way (to speak
only of the paths of peace) wholly inconsistent with shyness.
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