Explore "Colonel Quaritch, V. C" by H. Rider Haggard on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
For a minute or more her father fidgeted about, moving his papers backwards and forwards but saying nothing.
At last he spoke. "You have taken a most serious and painful step, Ida," he said. "Of course you have a right to do as you please, you are of full age, and I cannot expect that you will consider me or your family in your matrimonial engagements, but at the same time I think it is my duty to point out to you what it is that you are doing. You are refusing one of the finest matches in England in order to marry a broken-down, middle-aged, half-pay colonel, a man who can hardly support you, whose part in life is played, or who is apparently too idle to seek another."