But
although he seldom indulged in manifestations of parental
regard towards those whom he looked upon rather as
inferiors in military rank, than as beings connected with
him by the ties of blood, Colonel de Haldimar was not
without that instinctive love for his children, which
every animal in the creation feels for its offspring.
He, also, valued and took a pride in, because they
reflected a certain degree of lustre upon himself, the
talents and accomplishments of his eldest son, who,
moreover, was a brave, enterprising officer, and, only
wanted, in his father's estimation, that severity of
carriage and hauteur of deportment, befitting HIS son,
to render him perfect. As for Charles,--the gentle, bland,
winning, universally conciliating Charles,--he looked
upon him as a mere weak boy, who could never hope to
arrive at any post of distinction, if only by reason of
the extreme delicacy of his physical organisation; and
to have shown any thing like respect for his character,
or indulged in any expression of tenderness for one so
far below his estimate of what a soldier, a child of his,
ought to be, would have been a concession of which his
proud nature was incapable.
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