BOOK II. 

CHAPTER I. 

 Primitive character of the country in certain districts of Great Britain. --Connection between the features of surrounding scenery and the mental and moral inclinations of man, after the fashion of all sound ethnological historians. --A charioteer, to whom an experience of British laws suggests an ingenious mode of arresting the progress of Roman Papacy, carries Lionel Haughton and his fortunes to a place which allows of description and invites repose. 

In safety, but with naught else rare enough, in a railway train, todeserve commemoration, Lionel reached the station to which he was bound. He there inquired the distance to Fawley Manor House; it was five miles. He ordered a fly, and was soon wheeled briskly along a rough parish road, through a country strongly contrasting the gay river scenery he had solately quitted, --quite as English, but rather the England of a formerrace than that which spreads round our own generation like one vastsuburb of garden-ground and villas. Here, nor village nor spire, norporter's lodge came in sight. Rare even were the cornfields; wide spacesof unenclosed common opened, solitary and primitive, on the road, bordered by large woods, chiefly of beech, closing the horizon withridges of undulating green. In such an England, Knights Templars mighthave wended their way to scattered monasteries, or fugitive partisans inthe bloody Wars of the Roses have found shelter under leafy coverts. 

The scene had its romance, its beauty-half savage, half gentle-leadingperforce the mind of any cultivated and imaginative gazer far back fromthe present day, waking up long-forgotten passages from old poets. Thestillness of such wastes of sward, such deeps of woodland, induced thenurture of revery, gravely soft and lulling. There, Ambition might giverest to the wheel of Ixion, Avarice to the sieve of the Danaids; there, disappointed Love might muse on the brevity of all human passions, andcount over the tortured hearts that have found peace in holy meditation, or are now stilled under grassy knolls. See where, at the crossing ofthree roads upon the waste, the landscape suddenly unfolds, an upland inthe distance, and on the upland a building, the first sign of social man. What is the building? only a silenced windmill, the sails dark and sharpagainst the dull leaden sky. 

Lionel touched the driver, --"Are we yet on Mr. Darrell's property?" Ofthe extent of that property he had involuntarily conceived a vast idea. 

"Lord, sir, no; we be two miles from Squire Darrell's. He han't muchproperty to speak of hereabouts. But he bought a good bit o' land, too, some years ago, ten or twelve mile t' other side o' the county. Firsttime you are going to Fawley, sir?"

"Yes. "

"Ah! I don't mind seeing you afore; and I should have known you if Ihad, for it is seldom indeed I have a fare to Fawley old Manor House. Itmust be, I take it, four or five years ago sin' I wor there with a gent, and he went away while I wor feeding the horse; did me out o' my backfare. What bisness had he to walk when he came in my fly? Shabby. "

"Mr. Darrell lives very retired, then? sees few persons?" "S'pose so. I never seed him as I knows on; see'd two o' his hosses though, --raregood uns;" and the driver whipped on his own horse, took to whistling, and Lionel asked no more. 

At length the chaise stopped at a carriage gate, receding from the road, and deeply shadowed by venerable trees, --no lodge. The driver, dismounting, opened the gate. 

"Is this the place?"

The driver nodded assent, remounted, and drove on rapidly through whatnight by courtesy he called a park. The enclosure was indeed littlebeyond that of a good-sized paddock; its boundaries were visible on everyside: but swelling uplands covered with massy foliage sloped down to itswild, irregular turf soil, --soil poor for pasturage, but pleasant to theeye; with dell and dingle, bosks of fantastic pollards; dotted oaks ofvast growth; here and there a weird hollow thorn-tree; patches of fernand gorse. Hoarse and loud cawed the rooks; and deep, deep as from theinnermost core of the lovely woodlands came the mellow note of thecuckoo. A few moments more a wind of the road brought the house insight. At its rear lay a piece of water, scarcely large enough to bestyled a lake; too winding in its shaggy banks, its ends too concealed bytree and islet, to be called by the dull name of pond. Such as it was itarrested the eye before the gaze turned towards the house: it had an airof tranquillity so sequestered, so solemn. A lively man of the worldwould have been seized with spleen at the first glimpse of it; but he whohad known some great grief, some anxious care, would have drunk the calminto his weary soul like an anodyne. The house, --small, low, ancient, about the date of Edward VI. , before the statelier architecture ofElizabeth. Few houses in England so old, indeed, as Fawley Manor House. A vast weight of roof, with high gables; windows on the upper storyprojecting far over the lower part; a covered porch with a coat of half-obliterated arms deep panelled over the oak door. Nothing grand, yet allhow venerable! But what is this? Close beside the old, quiet, unassuming Manor House rises the skeleton of a superb and costly pile, --a palace uncompleted, and the work evidently suspended, --perhaps longsince, perhaps now forever. No busy workmen nor animated scaffolding. The perforated battlements roofed over with visible haste, --here withslate, there with tile; the Elizabethan mullion casements unglazed; someroughly boarded across, --some with staring forlorn apertures, that showedfloorless chambers, for winds to whistle through and rats to tenant. Weeds and long grass were growing over blocks of stone that lay at hand. A wallflower had forced itself into root on the sill of a giant oriel. The effect was startling. A fabric which he who conceived it must havefounded for posterity, --so solid its masonry, so thick its walls, --andthus abruptly left to moulder; a palace constructed for the reception ofcrowding guests, the pomp of stately revels, abandoned to owl and bat. And the homely old house beside it, which that lordly hall was doubtlessdesigned to replace, looking so safe and tranquil at the baffledpresumption of its spectral neighbour. 

The driver had rung the bell, and now turning back to the chaise metLionel's inquiring eye, and said, "Yes; Squire Darrell began to buildthat--many years ago--when I was a boy. I heerd say it was to be theshow-house of the whole county. Been stopped these ten or a dozenyears. "

"Why?--do you know?"

"No one knows. Squire was a laryer, I b'leve: perhaps he put it intoChancery. My wife's grandfather was put into Chancery jist as he wasgrowing up, and never grew afterwards: never got out o' it; nout everdoes. There's our churchwarden comes to me with a petition to sign aginthe Pope. Says I, 'That old Pope is always in trouble: what's he bindoin' now?' Says he, 'Spreading! He's a-got into Parlyment, and he'snow got a colledge, and we pays for it. I does n't know how to stop him. 'Says I, 'Put the Pope into Chancery, along with wife's grandfather, andhe'll never spread agin. '"

The driver had thus just disposed of the Papacy, when an elderly servantout of livery opened the door. Lionel sprang from the chaise, and pausedin some confusion: for then, for the first time, there darted across himthe idea that he had never written to announce his acceptance of Mr. Darrell's invitation; that he ought to have done so; that he might not beexpected. Meanwhile the servant surveyed him with some surprise. "Mr. Darrell?" hesitated Lionel, inquiringly. 

"Not at home, sir, " replied the man, as if Lionel's business was over, and he had only to re-enter his chaise. The boy was naturally ratherbold than shy, and he said, with a certain assured air, "My name isHaughton. I come here on Mr. Darrell's invitation. "

The servant's face changed in a moment; he bowed respectfully. "I begpardon, sir. I will look for my master; he is somewhere on the grounds. "The servant then approached the fly, took out the knapsack, and, observing Lionel had his purse in his hand, said, "Allow me to save youthat trouble, sir. Driver, round to the stable-yard. " Stepping backinto the house, the servant threw open a door to the left, on entrance, and advanced a chair. "If you will wait here a moment, sir, I will seekfor my master. "

CHAPTER II. 

Guy Darrell--and Stilled Life. 

The room in which Lionel now found himself was singularly quaint. Anantiquarian or architect would have discovered at a glance that at someperiod it had formed part of the entrance-hall; and when, in Elizabeth'sor James the First's day, the refinement in manners began to penetratefrom baronial mansions to the homes of the gentry, and the entrance-hallceased to be the common refectory of the owner and his dependants, thisapartment had been screened off by perforated panels, which for the sakeof warmth and comfort had been filled up into solid wainscot by asucceeding generation. Thus one side of the room was richly carved withgeometrical designs and arabesque pilasters, while the other three sideswere in small simple panels, with a deep fantastic frieze in plaster, depicting a deer-chase in relief and running be tween woodwork andceiling. The ceiling itself was relieved by long pendants without anyapparent meaning, and by the crest of the Darrells, --a heron, wreathedround with the family motto, "Ardua petit Ardea. " It was a dining-room, as was shown by the character of the furniture. But there was no attempton the part of the present owner, and there had clearly been none on thepart of his predecessor, to suit the furniture to the room. Thefurniture, indeed, was of the heavy, graceless taste of George theFirst, --cumbrous chairs in walnut-tree, with a worm-eaten mosaic of theheron on their homely backs, and a faded blue worsted on their seats; amarvellously ugly sideboard to match, and on it a couple of blackshagreen cases, the lids of which were flung open, and discovered thepistol-shaped handles of silver knives. The mantelpiece reached to theceiling, in panelled compartments, with heraldic shields, and supportedby rude stone Caryatides. On the walls were several pictures, --familyportraits, for the names were inscribed on the frames. They varied indate from the reign of Elizabeth to that of George I. A strong familylikeness pervaded them all, --high features, dark hair, grave aspects, --save indeed one, a Sir Ralph Haughton Darrell, in a dress that spoke himof the holiday date of Charles II. , --all knots, lace, and ribbons;evidently the beau of the race; and he had blue eyes, a blonde peruke, acareless profligate smile, and looked altogether as devil-me-care, rakehelly, handsome, good-for-nought, as ever swore at a drawer, beat awatchman, charmed a lady, terrified a husband, and hummed a song as hepinked his man. 

Lionel was still gazing upon the effigies of this airy cavalier when thedoor behind him opened very noiselessly, and a man of imposing presencestood on the threshold, --stood so still, and the carved mouldings of thedoorway so shadowed, and as it were cased round his figure, that Lionel, on turning quickly, might have mistaken him for a portrait brought intobold relief from its frame by a sudden fall of light. We hear it, indeed, familiarly said that such a one is like an old picture. Nevercould it be more appositely said than of the face on which the youngvisitor gazed, much startled and somewhat awed. Not such as inferiorlimners had painted in the portraits there, though it had something incommon with those family lineaments, but such as might have lookedtranquil power out of the canvas of Titian. 

The man stepped forward, and the illusion passed. "I thank you, " hesaid, holding out his hand, "for taking me at my word, and answering methus in person. " He paused a moment, surveying Lionel's countenance witha keen but not unkindly eye, and added softly, "Very like your father. "

At these words Lionel involuntarily pressed the hand which he had taken. That hand did not return the pressure. It lay an instant in Lionel'swarm clasp--not repelling, not responding--and was then very gentlywithdrawn. 

"Did you come from London?"

"No, sir; I found your letter yesterday at Hampton Court. I had beenstaying some days in that neighbourhood. I came on this morning: I wasafraid too unceremoniously; your kind welcome reassures me there. "

The words were well chosen and frankly said. Probably they pleased thehost, for the expression of his countenance was, on the whole, propitious; but he merely inclined his head with a kind of loftyindifference, then, glancing at his watch, he rang the bell. The servant entered promptly. "Let dinner be served within an hour. "

"Pray, sir, " said Lionel, "do not change your hours on my account. "

Mr. Darrell's brow slightly contracted. Lionel's tact was in faultthere; but the great man answered quietly, "All hours are the same to me;and it were strange if a host could be deranged by consideration to hisguest, --on the first day too. Are you tired? Would you like to go toyour room, or look out for half an hour? The sky is clearing. "

"I should so like to look out, sir. "

"This way then. "

Mr. Darrell, crossing the hall, threw open a door opposite to that bywhich Lionel entered, and the lake (we will so call it) lay before them, --separated from the house only by a shelving gradual declivity, on whichwere a few beds of flowers, --not the most in vogue nowadays, and disposedin rambling old-fashioned parterres. At one angle, a quaint anddilapidated sun-dial; at the other, a long bowling-alley, terminated byone of those summer-houses which the Dutch taste, following theRevolution of 1688, brought into fashion. Mr. Darrell passed down thisalley (no bowls there now), and observing that Lionel looked curiouslytowards the summer-house, of which the doors stood open, entered it. Alofty room with coved ceiling, painted with Roman trophies of helms andfasces, alternated with crossed fifes and fiddles, painted also. 

"Amsterdam manners, " said Mr. Darrell, slightly shrugging his shoulders. "Here a former race heard music, sang glees, and smoked from clay pipes. That age soon passed, unsuited to English energies, which are not to beunited with Holland phlegm! But the view from the window-look out there. I wonder whether men in wigs and women in hoops enjoyed that. It is amercy they did not clip those banks into a straight canal!"

The view was indeed lovely, --the water looked so blue and so large and solimpid, woods and curving banks reflected deep on its peaceful bosom. 

"How Vance would enjoy this!" cried Lionel. "It would come into apicture even better than the Thames. "

"Vance? who is Vance?"

"The artist, --a great friend of mine. Surely, sir, you have heard of himor seen his pictures!"

"Himself and his pictures are since my time. Days tread down days forthe recluse, and be forgets that celebrities rise with their suns, towane with their moons, "'Truditur dies die, Novaeque pergunt interire lunae'"

"All suns do not set; all moons do not wane!" cried Lionel, with bluntenthusiasm. "When Horace speaks elsewhere of the Julian star, hecompares it to a moon--'inter ignes minores'--and surely Fame is notamong the orbs which 'pergunt interire, '--hasten on to perish!"

"I am glad to see that you retain your recollections of Horace, " said Mr. Darrell, frigidly, and without continuing the allusion to celebrities;"the most charming of all poets to a man of my years, and" (he very drylyadded) "the most useful for popular quotation to men at any age. "

Then sauntering forth carelessly, he descended the sloping turf, came tothe water-side, and threw himself at length on the grass: the wild thymewhich he crushed sent up its bruised fragrance. There, resting his faceon his hand, Darrell gazed along the water in abstracted silence. Lionelfelt that he was forgotten; but he was not hurt. By this time a strongand admiring interest for his cousin had sprung up within his breast: hewould have found it difficult to explain why. But whosoever at thatmoment could have seen Guy Darrell's musing countenance, or whosoever, a few minutes before, could have heard the very sound of his voice, sweetly, clearly full; each slow enunciation unaffectedly, mellowlydistinct, --making musical the homeliest; roughest word, would haveunderstood and shared the interest which Lionel could not explain. Thereare living human faces, which, independently of mere physical beauty, charm and enthrall us more than the most perfect lineaments which Greeksculptor ever lent to a marble face; there are key-notes in the thrillinghuman voice, simply uttered, which can haunt the heart, rouse thepassions, lull rampant multitudes, shake into dust the thrones of guardedkings, and effect more wonders than ever yet have been wrought by themost artful chorus or the deftest quill. 

In a few minutes the swans from the farther end of the water came sailingswiftly towards the bank on which Darrell reclined. He had evidentlymade friends with them, and they rested their white breasts close on themargin, seeking to claim his notice with a low hissing salutation, which, it is to be hoped, they changed for something less sibilant in thatfamous song with which they depart this life. 

Darrell looked up. "They come to be fed, " said he, "smooth emblems ofthe great social union. Affection is the offspring of utility. I amuseful to them: they love me. " He rose, uncovered, and bowed to thebirds in mock courtesy: "Friends, I have no bread to give you. "

LIONEL. --"Let me run in for some. I would be useful too. "

MR. DARRELL. --"Rival!--useful to my swans?"

LIONEL (tenderly). --"Or to you, sir. "

He felt as if he had said too much, and without waiting for permission, ran indoors to find some one whom he could ask for the bread. 

"Sonless, childless, hopeless, objectless!" said Darrell, murmuringly tohimself, and sank again into revery. 

By the time Lionel returned with the bread, another petted friend hadjoined the master. A tame doe had caught sight of him from her covertfar away, came in light bounds to his side, and was pushing her delicatenostril into his drooping hand. At the sound of Lionel's hurried step, she took flight, trotted off a few paces, then turned, looking. 

"I did not know you had deer here. "

"Deer!--in this little paddock!--of course not; only that doe. Fairthornintroduced her here. By the by, " continued Darrell, who was now throwingthe bread to the swans, and had resumed his careless, unmeditativemanner, "you were not aware that I have a brother hermit, --a companion besides the swans and the doe. Dick Fairthorn is a year or two youngerthan myself, the son of my father's bailiff. He was the cleverest boy athis grammar-school. Unluckily he took to the flute, and unfitted himselffor the present century. He condescends, however, to act as mysecretary, --a fair classical scholar, plays chess, is useful to me, --I amuseful to him. We have an affection for each other. I never forgive anyone who laughs at him. The half-hour bell, and you will meet him atdinner. Shall we come in and dress?"

They entered the house; the same man-servant was in attendance in thehall. "Show Mr. Haughton to his room. " Darrell inclined his head--I usethat phrase, for the gesture was neither bow nor nod--turned down anarrow passage and disappeared. 

Led up an uneven staircase of oak, black as ebony, with huge balustrades, and newel-posts supporting clumsy balls, Lionel was conducted to a smallchamber, modernized a century ago by a faded Chinese paper, and amahogany bedstead, which took up three-fourths of the space, and wascrested with dingy plumes, that gave it the cheerful look of a hearse;and there the attendant said, "Have you the key of your knapsack, sir?shall I put out your things to dress?" Dress! Then for the first timethe boy remembered that he had brought with him no evening dress, --nay, evening dress, properly so called, he possessed not at all in any cornerof the world. It had never yet entered into his modes of existence. Call to mind when you were a boy of seventeen, "betwixt two ages hoveringlike a star, " and imagine Lionel's sensations. He felt his cheek burn asif he had been detected in a crime. "I have no dress things, " he saidpiteously; "only a change of linen, and this, " glancing at the summerjacket. The servant was evidently a most gentleman-like man: his nativesphere that of groom of the chambers. "I will mention it to Mr. Darrell;and if you will favour me with your address in London, I will send totelegraph for what you want against to-morrow. "

"Many thanks, " answered Lionel, recovering his presence of mind; "I willspeak to Mr. Darrell myself. "

"There is the hot water, sir; that is the bell. I have the honour to beplaced at your commands. " The door closed, and Lionel unlocked hisknapsack; other trousers, other waistcoat had he, --those worn at thefair, and once white. Alas! they had not since then passed to the careof the laundress. Other shoes, --double-soled for walking. There was nohelp for it but to appear at dinner, attired as he had been before, inhis light pedestrian jacket, morning waistcoat flowered with sprigs, anda fawn-coloured nether man. Could it signify much, --only two men? Couldthe grave Mr. Darrell regard such trifles?--Yes, if they intimated wantof due respect. 

 "Durum! sed fit levius Patientia Quicquid corrigere est nefas. "

On descending the stairs, the same high-bred domestic was in waiting toshow him into the library. Mr. Darrell was there already, in the simplebut punctilious costume of a gentleman who retains in seclusion thehabits customary in the world. At the first glance Lionel thought he sawa slight cloud of displeasure on his host's brow. He went up to Mr. Darrell ingenuously, and apologized for the deficiencies of his itinerantwardrobe. "Say the truth, " said his host; "you thought you were comingto an old churl, with whom ceremony was misplaced. "

"Indeed no!" exclaimed Lionel. "But--but I have so lately left school. "

"Your mother might have thought for you. "

"I did not stay to consult her, indeed, sir; I hope you are notoffended. "

"No, but let me not offend you if I take advantage of my years and ourrelationship to remark that a young man should be careful not to lethimself down below the standard of his own rank. If a king could bear tohear that he was only a ceremonial, a private gentleman may remember thatthere is but a ceremonial between himself and--his hatter!"

Lionel felt the colour mount his brow; but Darrell pressing thedistasteful theme no further, and seemingly forgetting its purport, turned his remarks carelessly towards the weather. "It will be fairto-morrow: there is no mist on the hill yonder. Since you have a painterfor a friend, perhaps you yourself are a draughtsman. There are somelandscape effects here which Fairthorn shall point out to you. "

"I fear, Mr. Darrell, " said Lionel, looking down, "that to-morrow I mustleave you. "

"So soon? Well, I suppose the place must be very dull. "

"Not that--not that; but I have offended you, and I would not repeat theoffence. I have not the 'ceremonial' necessary to mark me as agentleman, --either here or at home. "

"So! Bold frankness and ready wit command ceremonials, " returnedDarrell, and for the first time his lip wore a smile. "Let me present toyou Mr. Fairthorn, " as the door, opening, showed a shambling awkwardfigure, with loose black knee-breeches and buckled shoes. The figuremade a strange sidelong bow; and hurrying in a lateral course, likea crab suddenly alarmed, towards a dim recess protected by a long table, sank behind a curtain fold, and seemed to vanish as a crab does amidstthe shingles. 

"Three minutes yet to dinner, and two before the lettercarrier goes, "said the host, glancing at his watch. "Mr. Fairthorn, will you write anote for me?" There was a mutter from behind the curtain. Darrellwalked to the place, and whispered a few words, returned to the hearth, rang the bell. "Another letter for the post, Mills: Mr. Fairthorn issealing it. You are looking at my book-shelves, Lionel. As I understandthat your master spoke highly of you, I presume that you are fond ofreading. "

"I think so, but I am not sure, " answered Lionel, whom his cousin'sconciliatory words had restored to ease and good-humour. 

"You mean, perhaps, that you like reading, if you may choose your ownbooks. "

"Or rather, if I may choose my own time to read them, and that would notbe on bright summer days. "

"Without sacrificing bright summer days, one finds one has made littleprogress when the long winter nights come. "

"Yes, sir. But must the sacrifice be paid in books? I fancy I learnedas much in the play-ground as I did n the schoolroom, and for the lastfew months, in much my own master, reading hard in the forenoon, it istrue, for many hours at a stretch, and yet again for a few hours atevening, but rambling also through the streets, or listening to a fewfriends whom I have contrived to make, --I think, if I can boast of anyprogress at all, the books have the smaller share in it. "

"You would, then, prefer an active life to a studious one?"

"Oh, yes--yes. "

"Dinner is served, " said the decorous Mr. Mills, throwing open the door. 

CHAPTER III. 

 In our happy country every man's house is his castle. But however stoutly he fortify it, Care enters, as surely as she did in Horace's time, through the porticos of a Roman's villa. Nor, whether ceilings be fretted with gold and ivory, or whether only coloured with whitewash, does it matter to Care any more than it does to a house-fly. But every tree, be it cedar or blackthorn, can harbour its singing-bird; and few are the homes in which, from nooks least suspected, there starts not a music. Is it quite true that, "non avium citharaeque cantus somnum reducent"? Would not even Damocles himself have forgotten the sword, if the lute-player had chanced on the notes that lull?

The dinner was simple enough, but well dressed and well served. Onefootman, in plain livery, assisted Mr. Mills. Darrell ate sparingly, anddrank only water, which was placed by his side iced, with a single glassof wine at the close of the repast, which he drank on bending his head toLionel, with a certain knightly grace, and the prefatory words of"Welcome here to a Haughton. " Mr. Fairthorn was less abstemious; tastedof every dish, after examining it long through a pair of tortoise-shellspectacles, and drank leisurely through a bottle of port, holding upevery glass to the light. Darrell talked with his usual cold but notuncourteous indifference. A remark of Lionel on the portraits in theroom turned the conversation chiefly upon pictures, and the host showedhimself thoroughly accomplished in the attributes of the various schoolsand masters. Lionel, who was very fond of the art, and indeed paintedwell for a youthful amateur, listened with great delight. 

"Surely, sir, " said he, struck much with a very subtile observation uponthe causes why the Italian masters admit of copyists with greaterfacility than the Flemish, --"surely, sir, you yourself must havepractised the art of painting?"

"Not I; but I instructed myself as a judge of pictures, because at onetime I was a collector. "

Fairthorn, speaking for the first time: "The rarest collection, --suchAlbert Durers! such Holbeins! and that head by Leonardo da Vinci!" Hestopped; looked extremely frightened; helped himself to the port, turninghis back upon his host, to hold, as usual, the glass to the light. 

"Are they here, sir?" asked Lionel. 

Darrell's face darkened, and he made no answer; but his head sank on hisbreast, and he seemed suddenly absorbed in gloomy thought. Lionel feltthat he had touched a wrong chord, and glanced timidly towards Fairthorn;but that gentleman cautiously held up his finger, and then rapidly put itto his lip, and as rapidly drew it away. After that signal the boy didnot dare to break the silence, which now lasted uninterruptedly tillDarrell rose, and with the formal and superfluous question, "Any morewine?" led the way back to the library. There he ensconced himself in aneasy-chair, and saying, "Will you find a book for yourself, Lionel?"took a volume at random from the nearest shelf, and soon seemed absorbedin its contents. The room, made irregular by baywindows, and shelvesthat projected as in public libraries, abounded with nook and recess. Toone of these Fairthorn sidled himself, and became invisible. Lionellooked round the shelves. No belles lettres of our immediate generationwere found there; none of those authors most in request in circulatinglibraries and literary institutes. The shelves disclosed no poets, noessayists, no novelists, more recent than the Johnsonian age. Neither inthe lawyer's library were to be found any law books; no, nor thepamphlets and parliamentary volumes that should have spoken of the onceeager politician. But there were superb copies of the ancient classics. French and Italian authors were not wanting, nor such of the English ashave withstood the test of time. The larger portions of the shelvesseemed, however, devoted to philosophical works. Here alone was noveltyadmitted, the newest essays on science, or the best editions of old worksthereon. Lionel at length made his choice, --a volume of the "FaerieQueene. " Coffee was served; at a later hour tea. The clock struck ten. Darrell laid down his book. 

"Mr. Fairthorn, the flute!"

From the recess a mutter; and presently--the musician remaining stillhidden--there came forth the sweetest note, --so dulcet, so plaintive!Lionel's ear was ravished. The music suited well with the enchanted pagethrough which his fancy had been wandering dreamlike, --the flute with the"Faerie Queene. " As the air flowed liquid on, Lionel's eyes filled withtears. He did not observe that Darrell was intently watching him. Whenthe music stopped, he turned aside to wipe the tears from his eyes. Somehow or other, what with the poem, what with the flute, his thoughtshad wandered far, far hence to the green banks and blue waves of theThames, --to Sophy's charming face, to her parting childish gift! Andwhere was she now? Whither passing away, after so brief a holiday, intothe shadows of forlorn life? Darrell's bell-like voice smote his ear. 

"Spenser; you love him! Do you write poetry?" "No, sir: I only feelit!"

"Do neither!" said the host, abruptly. Then, turning away, he lightedhis candle, murmured a quick good-night, and disappeared through a side-door which led to his own rooms. 

Lionel looked round for Fairthorn, who now emerged /ab anqulo/ from hisnook. 

"Oh, Mr. Fairthorn, how you have enchanted me! I never believed theflute could have been capable of such effects!"

Mr. Fairthorn's grotesque face lighted up. He took off his spectacles, as if the better to contemplate the face of his eulogist. "So you werepleased! really?" he said, chuckling a strange, grim chuckle, deep in hisinmost self. 

"Pleased! it is a cold word! Who would not be more than pleased?"

"You should hear me in the open air. "

"Let me do so-to-morrow. "

"My dear young sir, with all my heart. Hist!"--gazing round as ifhaunted, --"I like you. I wish him to like you. Answer all his questionsas if you did not care how he turned you inside out. Never ask him aquestion, as if you sought to know what he did not himself confide. Sothere is some thing, you think, in a flute, after all? There are peoplewho prefer the fiddle. "

"Then they never heard your flute, Mr. Fairthorn. " The musician againemitted his discordant chuckle, and, nodding his head nervously andcordially, shambled away without lighting a candle, and was engulfed inthe shadows of some mysterious corner. 

CHAPTER IV. 

 The old world and the new. 

It was long before Lionel could sleep. What with the strange house andthe strange master, what with the magic flute and the musician'sadmonitory caution, what with tender and regretful reminiscences ofSophy, his brain had enough to work on. When he slept at last, hisslumber was deep and heavy, and he did not wake till gently shaken by thewell-bred arm of Mr. Mills. "I humbly beg pardon: nine o'clock, sir, andthe breakfast-bell going to ring. " Lionel's toilet was soon hurriedover; Mr. Darrell and Fairthorn were talking together as he entered thebreakfast-room, --the same room as that in which they had dined. 

"Good morning, Lionel, " said the host. "No leave-taking to-day, as youthreatened. I find you have made an appointment with Mr. Fairthorn, andI shall place you under his care. You may like to look over the oldhouse, and make yourself"--Darrell paused "at home, " jerked out Mr. Fairthorn, filling up the hiatus. Darrell turned his eye towards thespeaker, who evidently became much frightened, and, after looking in vainfor a corner, sidled away to the window and poked himself behind thecurtain. "Mr. Fairthorn, in the capacity of my secretary, has learned tofind me thoughts, and put them in his own words, " said Darrell, with acoldness almost icy. He then seated himself at the breakfast-table;Lionel followed his example, and Mr. Fairthorn, courageously emerging, also took a chair and a roll. "You are a true diviner, Mr. Darrell, "said Lionel; "it is a glorious day. "

"But there will be showers later. The fish are at play on the surface ofthe lake, " Darrell added, with a softened glance towards Fairthorn, whowas looking the picture of misery. "After twelve, it will be just theweather for trout to rise; and if you fish, Mr. Fairthorn will lend you arod. He is a worthy successor of Izaak Walton, and loves a companion asIzaak did, but more rarely gets one. "

"Are there trout in your lake, sir?"

"The lake! You must not dream of invading that sacred water. Theinhabitants of rivulets and brooks not within my boundary are beyond thepale of Fawley civilization, to be snared and slaughtered like Caifres, red men, or any other savages, for whom we bait with a missionary andwhom we impale on a bayonet. But I regard my lake as a politiccommunity, under the protection of the law, and leave its denizens todevour each other, as Europeans, fishes, and other cold-blooded creatureswisely do, in order to check the overgrowth of population. To fatten onepike it takes a great many minnows. Naturally I support the vestedrights of pike. I have been a lawyer. "

It would be in vain to describe the manner in which Mr. Darrell ventedthis or similar remarks of mocking irony or sarcastic spleen. It was notbitter nor sneering, but in his usual mellifluous level tone andpassionless tranquillity. 

The breakfast was just over as a groom passed in front of the windowswith a led horse. "I am going to leave you, Lionel, " said the host, "tomake--friends with Mr. Fairthorn, and I thus complete, according to myown original intention, the sentence which he diverted astray. " Hepassed across the hall to the open house-door, and stood by the horse, stroking its neck and giving some directions to the groom. Lionel andFairthorn followed to the threshold, and the beauty of the horse provokedthe boy's admiration: it was a dark muzzled brown, of that fine old-fashioned breed of English roadster which is now so seldom seen, --showy, bownecked, long-tailed, stumbling, reedy hybrids, born of bad barbs, ill-mated, having mainly supplied their place. This was, indeed, a horse ofgreat power, immense girth of loin, high shoulder, broad hoof; and such ahead! the ear, the frontal, the nostril! you seldom see a humanphysiognomy half so intelligent, half so expressive of that high spiritand sweet generous temper, which, when united, constitute the ideal ofthorough-breeding, whether in horse or man. The English rider was inharmony with the English steed. Darrell at this moment was resting hisarm lightly on the animal's shoulder, and his head still uncovered. Ithas been said before that he was, of imposing presence; the strikingattribute of his person, indeed, was that of unconscious grandeur; yet, though above the ordinary height, he was not very tall-five feet elevenat the utmost-and far from being very erect. On the contrary, there wasthat habitual bend in his proud neck which men who meditate much and livealone almost invariably contract. But there was, to use an expressioncommon with our older writers, that "great air" about him which filledthe eye, and gave him the dignity of elevated stature, the commandingaspect that accompanies the upright carriage. His figure was inclined tobe slender, though broad of shoulder and deep of chest; it was the figureof a young man and probably little changed from what it might have beenat five-and-twenty. A certain youthfulness still lingered even on thecountenance, --strange, for sorrow is supposed to expedite the work ofage; and Darrell had known sorrow of a kind most adapted to harrow hispeculiar nature, as great in its degree as ever left man's heart inruins. No gray was visible in the dark brown hair, that, worn shortbehind, still retained in front the large Jove-like curl. No wrinkle, save at the corner of the eyes, marred the pale bronze of the firm cheek;the forehead was smooth as marble, and as massive. It was that foreheadwhich chiefly contributed to the superb expression of his whole aspect. It was high to a fault; the perceptive organs, over a dark, strongly-marked, arched eyebrow, powerfully developed, as they are with mosteminent lawyers; it did not want for breadth at the temples; yet, on thewhole, it bespoke more of intellectual vigour and dauntless will than ofserene philosophy or all-embracing benevolence. It was the forehead of aman formed to command and awe the passions and intellect of others by thestrength of passions in himself, rather concentred than chastised, and byan intellect forceful from the weight of its mass rather than theniceness of its balance. The other features harmonized with that brow;they were of the noblest order of aquiline, at once high and delicate. The lip had a rare combination of exquisite refinement and inflexibleresolve. The eye, in repose, was cold, bright, unrevealing, with acertain absent, musing, self-absorbed expression, that often made theman's words appear as if spoken mechanically, and assisted towards thatseeming of listless indifference to those whom he addressed, by which hewounded vanity without, perhaps, any malice prepense. But it was an eyein which the pupil could suddenly expand, the hue change from gray todark, and the cold still brightness flash into vivid fire. It could nothave occurred to any one, even to the most commonplace woman, to havedescribed Darrell's as a handsome face; the expression would have seemedtrivial and derogatory; the words that would have occurred to all, wouldhave been somewhat to this effect: "What a magnificent countenance! Whata noble head!" Yet an experienced physiognomist might have noted thatthe same lineaments which bespoke a virtue bespoke also its neighbouringvice; that with so much will there went stubborn obstinacy; that withthat power of grasp there would be the tenacity in adherence whichnarrows, in astringing, the intellect; that a prejudice once conceived, a passion once cherished, would resist all rational argument forrelinquishment. When men of this mould do relinquish prejudice orpassion, it is by their own impulse, their own sure conviction that whatthey hold is worthless: then they do not yield it graciously; they flingit from them in scorn, but not a scorn that consoles. That which theythus wrench away had "grown a living part of themselves;" their own fleshbleeds; the wound seldom or never heals. Such men rarely fail in theachievement of what they covet, if the gods are neutral; but, adamantagainst the world, they are vulnerable through their affections. Theirlove is intense, but undemonstrative; their hatred implacable, butunrevengeful, --too proud to revenge, too galled to pardon. 

There stood Guy Darrell, to whom the bar had destined its highesthonours, to whom the senate had accorded its most rapturous cheers; andthe more you gazed on him as he there stood, the more perplexed becamethe enigma, --how with a career sought with such energy, advanced withsuch success, the man had abruptly subsided into a listless recluse, andthe career had been voluntarily resigned for a home without neighbours, ahearth without children. 

"I had no idea, " said Lionel, as Darrell rode slowly away, soon lost fromsight amidst the thick foliage of summer trees, --"I had no idea that mycousin was so young!"

"Oh, yes, " said Mr. Fairthorn; "he is only a year older than I am!"

"Older than you!" exclaimed Lionel, staring in blunt amaze at theelderly-looking personage beside him; "yet true, he told me so himself. "

"And I am fifty-one last birthday. " "Mr. Darrell fifty-two! Incredible!"

"I don't know why we should ever grow old, the life we lead, " observedMr. Fairthorn, readjusting his spectacles. "Time stands so still!Fishing, too, is very conducive to longevity. If you will follow me, wewill get the rods; and the flute, --you are quite sure you would like theflute? Yes! thank you, my dear young sir. And yet there are folks whoprefer the fiddle!"

"Is not the sun a little too bright for the fly at present; and will younot, in the meanwhile, show me over the house?"

"Very well; not that this house has much worth seeing. The other indeedwould have had a music-room! But, after all, nothing like the open airfor the flute. This way. "

I spare thee, gentle reader, the minute inventory of Fawley Manor House. It had nothing but its antiquity to recommend it. It had a great manyrooms, all, except those used as the dining-room and library, very small, and very low, --innumerable closets, nooks, --unexpected cavities, as ifmade on purpose for the venerable game of hide-and-seek. Save a statelyold kitchen, the offices were sadly defective even for Mr. Darrell'sdomestic establishment, which consisted but of two men and four maids(the stablemen not lodging in the house). Drawing-room properly speakingthat primitive mansion had none. At some remote period a sort of galleryunder the gable roofs (above the first floor), stretching from end to endof the house, might have served for the reception of guests on grandoccasions; for fragments of mouldering tapestry still here and thereclung to the walls; and a high chimney-piece, whereon, in plaster relief, was commemorated the memorable fishing party of Antony and Cleopatra, retained patches of colour and gilding, which must when fresh have madethe Egyptian queen still more appallingly hideous, and the fish at theend of Antony's hook still less resembling any creature known toichthyologists. 

The library had been arranged into shelves from floor to roof by Mr. Darrell's father, and subsequently, for the mere purpose of holding asmany volumes as possible, brought out into projecting wings (college-like) by Darrell himself, without any pretension to mediaeval character. With this room communicated a small reading-closet, which the hostreserved to himself; and this, by a circular stair cut into the massivewall, ascended first into Mr. Darrell's sleeping-chamber, and thence intoa gable recess that adjoined the gallery, and which the host had fittedup for the purpose of scientific experiments in chemistry or otherbranches of practical philosophy. These more private rooms Lionel wasnot permitted to enter. Altogether the house was one of those crueltenements which it would be a sin to pull down, or even materially toalter, but which it would be an hourly inconvenience for a modern familyto inhabit. It was out of all character with Mr. Darrell's formerposition in life, or with the fortune which Lionel vaguely supposed himto possess, and considerably underrated. Like Sir Nicholas Bacon, theman had grown too large for his habitation. 

"I don't wonder, " said Lionel, as, their wanderings over, he andFairthorn found themselves in the library, "that Mr. Darrell began tobuild a new house. But it would have been a great pity to pull down thisfor it. "

"Pull down this! Don't hint at such an idea to Mr. Darrell. He would assoon have pulled down the British Monarchy! Nay, I suspect, sooner. "

"But the new building must surely have swallowed up the old one?"

"Oh, no; Mr. Darrell had a plan by which he would have enclosed thisseparately in a kind of court, with an open screen-work or cloister; andit was his intention to appropriate it entirely to mediaeval antiquities, of which he has a wonderful collection. He had a notion of illustratingevery earlier reign in which his ancestors flourished, --differentapartments in correspondence with different dates. It would have been achronicle of national manners. "

"But, if it be not an impertinent question, where is this collection?In London?"

"Hush! hush! I will give you a peep of some of the treasures, only don'tbetray me. "

Fairthorn here, with singular rapidity, considering that he never movedin a straightforward direction, undulated into the open air in front ofthe house, described a rhomboid towards a side-buttress in the newbuilding, near to which was a postern-door; unlocked that door from a keyin his pocket, and, motioning Lionel to follow him, entered within theribs of the stony skeleton. Lionel followed in a sort of supernaturalawe, and beheld, with more substantial alarm, Mr. Fairthorn winding up aninclined plank which lie embraced with both arms, and by which heultimately ascended to a timber joist in what should have been an upperfloor, only flooring there was none. Perched there, Fairthorn glareddown on Lionel through his spectacles. "Dangerous, " he saidwhisperingly; "but one gets used to everything! If you feel afraid, don't venture!"

Lionel, animated by that doubt of his courage, sprang up the plank, balancing himself schoolboy fashion, with outstretched arms, and gainedthe side of his guide. 

"Don't touch me!" exclaimed Mr. Fairthorn, shrinking, "or we shall bothbe over. Now observe and imitate. " Dropping himself, then, carefullyand gradually, till he dropped on the timber joist as if it were avelocipede, his long legs dangling down, he with thigh and hand impelledhimself onward till he gained the ridge of a wall, on which he deliveredhis person, and wiped his spectacles. 

Lionel was not long before he stood in the same place. "Here we are, "said Fairthorn. 

"I don't see the collection, " answered Lionel, first peering down athwartthe joists upon the rugged ground overspread with stones and rubbish, then glancing up through similar interstices above to the gaunt rafters. 

"Here are some, --most precious, " answered Fairthorn, tapping behind him. "Walled up, except where these boards, cased in iron, are nailed across, with a little door just big enough to creep through; but that is locked, --Chubb's lock, and Mr. Darrell keeps the key!--treasures for a palace!No, you can't peep through here--not a chink; but come on a littlefurther, --mind your footing. "

Skirting the wall, and still on the perilous ridge, Fairthorn crept on, formed an angle, and stopping short, clapped his eye to the crevice ofsome planks nailed rudely across a yawning aperture. Lionel foundanother crevice for himself, and saw, piled up in admired disorder, pictures, with their backs turned to a desolate wall, rare cabinets, andarticles of curious furniture, chests, boxes, crates, --heaped pell-mell. This receptacle had been roughly floored in deal, in order to support itsmiscellaneous contents, and was lighted from a large window (not visiblein front of the house), glazed in dull rough glass, with ventilators. 

"These are the heavy things, and least costly things, that no one couldwell rob. The pictures here are merely curious as early specimens, intended for the old house, all spoiling and rotting; Mr. Darrell wishesthem to do so, I believe! What he wishes must be done! my dear young sir:a prodigious mind; it is of granite!"

"I cannot understand it, " said Lionel, aghast. "The last man I shouldhave thought capriciously whimsical. "

"Whimsical! Bless my soul! don't say such a word, don't, pray! or theroof will fall down upon us! Come away. You have seen all you can see. You must go first now; mind that loose stone there!"

Nothing further was said till they were out of the building; and Lionelfelt like a knight of old who had been led into sepulchral halls by awizard. 

CHAPTER V. 

 The annals of empire are briefly chronicled in family records brought down to the present day, showing that the race of men is indeed "like leaves on trees, now green in youth, now withering on the ground. " Yet to the branch the most bare will green leaves return, so long as the sap can remount to the branch from the root; but the branch which has ceased to take life from the root--hang it high, hang it low--is a prey to the wind and the woodman. 

It was mid-day. The boy and his new friend were standing apart, asbecomes silent anglers, on the banks of a narrow brawling rivulet, running through green pastures, half a mile from the house. The sky wasovercast, as Darrell had predicted, but the rain did not yet fall. Thetwo anglers were not long before they had filled a basket with smalltrout. Then Lionel, who was by no means fond of fishing, laid his rod onthe bank, and strolled across the long grass to his companion. 

"It will rain soon, " said he. "Let us take advantage of the presenttime, and hear the flute, while we can yet enjoy the open air. No, notby the margin, or you will be always looking after the trout. On therising ground, see that old thorn tree; let us go and sit under it. Thenew building looks well from it. What a pile it would have been! I maynot ask you, I suppose, why it is left uncompleted. Perhaps it wouldhave cost too much, or would have been disproportionate to the estate. "

"To the present estate it would have been disproportioned, but not to theestate Mr. Darrell intended to add to it. As to cost, you don't knowhim. He would never have undertaken what he could not afford tocomplete; and what he once undertook, no thoughts of the cost would havescared him from finishing. Prodigious mind, --granite! And so rich!"added Fairthorn, with an air of great pride. "I ought to know; I writeall his letters on money matters. How much do you think he has, withoutcounting land?"

"I cannot guess. "

"Nearly half a million; in two years it will be more than half a million. And he had not three hundred a year when he began life; for Fawley wassadly mortgaged. "

"Is it possible! Could any lawyer make half a million at the bar?"

"If any man could, Mr. Darrell would. When he sets his mind on a thing, the thing is done; no help for it. But his fortune was not all made atthe bar, though a great part of it was. An old East Indian bachelor ofthe same name, but who had never been heard of hereabouts till he wrotefrom Calcutta to Mr. Darrell (inquiring if they were any relation, andMr. Darrell referred him to the College-at-Arms, which proved that theycame from the same stock ages ago), left him all his money. Mr. Darrellwas not dependent on his profession when he stood up in Parliament. Andsince we have been here, such savings! Not that Mr. Darrell isavaricious, but how can he spend money in this place? You should haveseen the establishment we kept in Carlton Gardens. Such a cook too, --a French gentleman, looked like a marquis. Those were happy days, andproud ones! It is true that I order the dinner here, but it can't be thesame thing. Do you like fillet of veal?--we have one to-day. "

"We used to have fillet of veal at school on Sundays. I thought it goodthen. "

"It makes a nice mince, " said Mr. Fairthorn, with a sensual movement ofhis lips. "One must think of dinner when one lives in the country: solittle else to think of! Not that Mr. Darrell does, but then he isgranite!"

"Still, " said Lionel, smiling, "I do not get my answer. Why was thehouse uncompleted? and why did Mr. Darrell retire from public life?"

"He took both into his head; and when a thing once gets there, it is nouse asking why. But, " added Fairthorn, and his innocent ugly facechanged into an expression of earnest sadness, --"but no doubt he had hisreasons. He has reasons for all he does, only they lie far, far awayfrom what appears on the surface, --far as that rivulet lies from itssource! My dear young sir, Mr. Darrell has known griefs on which it doesnot become you and me to talk. He never talks of them. The least I cando for my benefactor is not to pry into his secrets, nor babble them out. And he is so kind, so good, never gets into a passion; but it is so awfulto wound him, --it gives him such pain; that's why he frightens me, --frightens me horribly; and so he will you when you come to know him. Prodigious mind!--granite, --overgrown with sensitive plants. Yes, alittle music will do us both good. "

Mr. Fairthorn screwed his flute, an exceedingly handsome one. He pointedout its beauties to Lionel--a present from Mr. Darrell last Christmas--and then he began. Strange thing, Art! especially music. Out of anart, a man may be so trivial you would mistake him for an imbecile, --atbest a grown infant. Put him into his art, and how high he soars aboveyou! How quietly he enters into a heaven of which he has become adenizen, and unlocking the gates with his golden key, admits you tofollow, a humble reverent visitor. 

In his art, Fairthorn was certainly a master, and the air he now playedwas exquisitely soft and plaintive; it accorded with the clouded yetquiet sky, with the lone but summer landscape, with Lionel's melancholicbut not afflicted train of thought. The boy could only murmur"Beautiful!" when the musician ceased. 

"It is an old air, " said Fairthorn; "I don't think it is known. I foundits scale scrawled down in a copy of the 'Eikon Basilike, ' with the nameof 'Joannes Darrell, Esq. , Aurat, ' written under it. That, by the date, was Sir John Darrell, the cavalier who fought for Charles I. , father ofthe graceless Sir Ralph, who flourished under Charles II. Both theirportraits are in the dining-room. "

"Tell me something of the family; I know so little about it, --not evenhow the Haughtons and Darrells seem to have been so long connected. Isee by the portraits that the Haughton name was borne by former Darrells, then apparently dropped, now it is borne again by my cousin. "

"He bears it only as a Christian name. Your grandfather was his sponsor. But he is nevertheless the head of your family. "

"So he says. How?"

Fairthorn gathered himself up, his knees to his chin, and began in thetone of a guide who has got his lesson by heart; though it was not longbefore he warmed into his subject. 

"The Darrells are supposed to have got their name from a knight in thereign of Edward III. , who held the lists in a joust victoriously againstall comers, and was called, or called himself, John the Dare-all; or, inold spelling, the Der-all. They were amongst the most powerful familiesin the country; their alliances were with the highest houses, --Montfichets, Nevilles, Mowbrays; they descended through such marriagesfrom the blood of Plantagenet kings. You'll find their names inchronicles in the early French wars. Unluckily they attached themselvesto the fortunes of Earl Warwick, the king-maker, to whose blood they wereallied; their representative was killed in the fatal field of Barnet;their estates were of course confiscated; the sole son and heir of thatill-fated politician passed into the Low Countries, where he served as asoldier. His son and grandson followed the same calling under foreignbanners. But they must have kept up the love of the old land; for in thelatter part of the reign of Henry VIII. , the last male Darrell returnedto England with some broad gold pieces saved by himself or his exiledfathers, bought some land in this county, in which the ancestralpossessions had once been large, and built the present house, of a sizesuited to the altered fortunes of a race that in a former age had mannedcastles with retainers. The baptismal name of the soldier who thuspartially refounded the old line in England was that now borne by yourcousin, Guy, --a name always favoured by Fortune in the family annals; forin Elizabeth's time, from the rank of small gentry, to which theirfortune alone lifted them since their return to their native land, theDarrells rose once more into wealth and eminence under a handsome youngSir Guy, --we have his picture in black flowered velvet, --who married theheiress of the Haughtons, a family that had grown rich under the Tudors, and was in high favour with the Maiden-Queen. This Sir Guy wasbefriended by Essex and knighted by Elizabeth herself. Their old housewas then abandoned for the larger mansion of the Haughtons, which hadalso the advantage of being nearer to the Court, The renewed prosperityof the Darrells was of short duration. The Civil Wars came on, and SirJohn Darrell took the losing side. He escaped to France with his onlyson. He is said to have been an accomplished, melancholy man; and mybelief is, that he composed that air which you justly admire for itsmournful sweetness. He turned Roman Catholic and died in a convent. Butthe son, Ralph, was brought up in France with Charles II, and other gayroisterers. On the return of the Stuart, Ralph ran off with the daughterof the Roundhead to whom his estates had been given, and, after gettingthem back, left his wife in the country, and made love to other men'swives in town. Shocking profligate! no fruit could thrive upon such abranch. He squandered all he could squander, and would have left hischildren beggars, but that he was providentially slain in a tavern brawlfor boasting of a lady's favours to her husband's face. The husbandsuddenly stabbed him, --no fair duello, for Sir Ralph was invincible withthe small sword. Still the family fortune was much dilapidated, yetstill the Darrells lived in the fine house of the Haughtons, and leftFawley to the owls. But Sir Ralph's son, in his old age, married asecond time, a young lady of high rank, an earl's daughter. He must havebeen very much in love with her, despite his age, for to win her consentor her father's he agreed to settle all the Haughton estates on her andthe children she might bear to him. The smaller Darrell property hadalready been entailed on his son by his first marriage. This is how thefamily came to split. Old Darrell had children by his second wife; theeldest of those children took the Haughton name and inherited theHaughton property. The son by the first marriage had nothing but Fawleyand the scanty domain round it. You descend from the second marriage, Mr. Darrell from the first. You understand now, my dear young sir?""Yes, a little; but I should very much like to know where those fineHaughton estates are now?"

"Where they are now? I can't say. They were once in Middlesex. Probably much of the land, as it was sold piecemeal, fell into smallallotments, constantly changing hands. But the last relics of theproperty were, I know, bought on speculation by Cox the distiller; for, when we were in London, by Mr. Darrell's desire I went to look afterthem, and inquire if they could be repurchased. And I found that sorapid in a few years has been the prosperity of this great commercialcountry, that if one did buy them back, one would buy twelve villas, several streets, two squares, and a paragon! But as that symptom ofnational advancement, though a proud thought in itself, may not have anypleasing interest for you, I return to the Darrells. From the time inwhich the Haughton estate had parted from them, they settled back intheir old house of Fawley. But they could never again hold up theirheads with the noblemen and great squires in the county. As much as theycould do to live at all upon the little patrimony; still the reminiscenceof what they had been made them maintain it jealously and entail itrigidly. The eldest son would never have thought of any profession orbusiness; the younger sons generally became soldiers, and being always aventuresome race, and having nothing particular to make them value theirexistence, were no less generally killed off betimes. The family becamethoroughly obscure, slipped out of place in the county, seldom rose to beeven justices of the peace, never contrived to marry heiresses again, but only the daughters of some neighbouring parson or squire as poor asthemselves, but always of gentle blood. Oh, they were as proud asSpaniards in that respect! So from father to son, each generation grewobscurer and poorer; for, entail the estate as they might, still somesettlements on it were necessary, and no settlements were ever broughtinto it; and thus entails were cut off to admit some new mortgage, tillthe rent-roll was somewhat less than L300 a year when Mr. Darrell'sfather came into possession. Yet somehow or other he got to college, where no Darrell had been since the time of the Glorious Revolution, andwas a learned man and an antiquary, --A GREAT ANTIQUARY! You may haveread his works. I know there is one copy of them in the British Museum, and there is another here, but that copy Mr. Darrell keeps under lock andkey. "

"I am ashamed to say I don't even know the titles of those works. "

"There were 'Popular Ballads on the Wars of the Roses;' 'Darrelliana, 'consisting of traditional and other memorials of the Darrell family;'Inquiry into the Origin of Legends Connected with Dragons;' 'Hoursamongst Monumental Brasses, ' and other ingenious lucubrations above thetaste of the vulgar; some of them were even read at the Royal Society ofAntiquaries. They cost much to print and publish. But I have heard myfather, who was his bailiff, say that he was a pleasant man, and was fondof reciting old scraps of poetry, which he did with great energy; indeed, Mr. Darrell declares that it was the noticing, in his father's animatedand felicitous elocution, the effects that voice, look, and delivery cangive to words, which made Mr. Darrell himself the fine speaker he is. But I can only recollect the antiquary as a very majestic gentleman, witha long pigtail--awful, rather, not so much so as his son, but still awful--and so sad-looking; you would not have recovered your spirits for aweek if you had seen him, especially when the old house wanted repairs, and he was thinking how he could pay for them!"

"Was Mr. Darrell, the present one, an only child?"

"Yes, and much with his father, whom he loved most dearly, and to thisday he sighs if he has to mention his father's name! He has old Mr. Darrell's portrait over the chimney-piece in his own reading-room; and hehad it in his own library in Carlton Gardens. Our Mr. Darrell's motherwas very pretty, even as I remember her: she died when he was about tenyears old. And she too was a relation of yours, --a Haughton by blood, --but perhaps you will be ashamed of her, when I say she was a governess ina rich mercantile family. She had been left an orphan. I believe oldMr. Darrell (not that he was old then) married her because the Haughtonscould or would do nothing for her, and because she was much snubbed andput upon, as I am told governesses usually are, --married her because, poor as he was, he was still the head of both families, and bound to dowhat he could for decayed scions. The first governess a Darrell, evermarried; but no true Darrell would have called that a mesalliance sinceshe was still a Haughton and 'Fors non mutat genus, '--Chance does notchange race. "

"But how comes it that the Haughtons, my grandfather Haughton, I suppose, would do nothing for his own kinswoman?"

"It was not your grandfather Robert Haughton, who was a generous man, --he was then a mere youngster, hiding himself for debt, --but your great--grandfather, who was a hard man and on the turf. He never had money togive, --only money for betting. He left the Haughton estates sadlyclipped. But when Robert succeeded, he came forward, was godfather toour Mr. Darrell, insisted on sharing the expense of sending him to Eton, where he became greatly distinguished; thence to Oxford, where heincreased his reputation; and would probably have done more for him, onlyMr. Darrell, once his foot on the ladder, wanted no help to climb to thetop. "

"Then my grandfather, Robert, still had the Haughton estates? Their lastrelics had not been yet transmuted by Mr. Cox into squares and aparagon?"

"No; the grand old mansion, though much dilapidated, with its park, though stripped of salable timber, was still left with a rental fromfarms that still appertained to the residence, which would have sufficeda prudent man for the luxuries of life, and allowed a reserve fund toclear off the mortgages gradually. Abstinence and self-denial for one ortwo generations would have made a property, daily rising in value as themetropolis advanced to its outskirts, a princely estate for a third. ButRobert Haughton, though not on the turf, had a grand way of living; andwhile Guy Darrell went into the law to make a small patrimony a largefortune, your father, my dear young sir, was put into the Guards toreduce a large patrimony--into Mr. Cox's distillery. "

Lionel coloured, but remained silent. 

Fairthorn, who was as unconscious in his zest of narrator that he wasgiving pain as an entomologist in his zest for collecting when he pins alive moth in his cabinet, resumed: "Your father and Guy Darrell were warmfriends as boys and youths. Guy was the elder of the two, and CharlieHaughton (I beg your pardon, he was always called Charlie) looked up tohim as to an elder brother. Many's the scrape Guy got him out of; andmany a pound, I believe, when Guy had some funds of his own, did Guy lendto Charlie. "

"I am very sorry to hear that, " said Lionel, sharply. Fairthorn lookedfrightened. "I 'm afraid I have made a blunder. Don't tell Mr. Darrell. "

"Certainly not; I promise. But how came my father to need this aid, andhow came they at last to quarrel?"

Your father Charlie became a gay young man about town, and very much thefashion. He was like you in person, only his forehead was lower, and hiseye not so steady. Mr. Darrell studied the law in chambers. When RobertHaughton died, what with his debts, what with his father's, and what withCharlie's post-obits and I O U's, there seemed small chance indeed ofsaving the estate to the Haughtons. But then Mr. Darrell looked closeinto matters, and with such skill did he settle them that he removed thefear of foreclosure; and what with increasing the rental here and there, and replacing old mortgages by new at less interest, he contrived toextract from the property an income of nine hundred pounds a year toCharlie (three times the income Darrell had inherited himself), wherebefore it had seemed that the debts were more than the assets. Foreseeing how much the land would rise in value, he then earnestlyimplored Charlie (who unluckily had the estate in fee-simple, as Mr. Darrell has this, to sell if he pleased) to live on his income, and in afew years a part of the property might be sold for building purposes, onterms that would save all the rest, with the old house in which Darrellsand Haughtons both had once reared generations. Charlie promised, Iknow, and I've no doubt, my dear young sir, quite sincerely; but all menare not granite! He took to gambling, incurred debts of honour, sold thefarms one by one, resorted to usurers, and one night, after playing sixhours at piquet, nothing was left for him but to sell all that remainedto Mr. Cox the distiller, unknown to Mr. Darrell, who was then marriedhimself, working hard, and living quite out of news of the fashionableworld. Then Charlie Haughton sold out of the Guards, spent what he gotfor his commission, went into the Line; and finally, in a country town, in which I don't think he was quartered, but having gone there on somesporting speculation, was unwillingly detained, married--"

"My mother!" said Lionel, haughtily; "and the best of women she is. What then?"

"Nothing, my dear young sir, --nothing, except that Mr. Darrell neverforgave it. He has his prejudices: this marriage shocked one of them. "

"Prejudice against my poor mother! I always supposed so! I wonder why?The most simple-hearted, inoffensive, affectionate woman. "

"I have not a doubt of it; but it is beginning to rain. Let us go home. I should like some luncheon: it breaks the day. "

"Tell me first why Mr. Darrell has a prejudice against my mother. I don't think that he has even seen her. Unaccountable caprice! Shockedhim, too, --what a word! Tell me--I beg--I insist. "

"But you know, " said Fairthorn, half piteously, half snappishly, "thatMrs. Haughton was the daughter of a linendraper, and her father's moneygot Charlie out of the county jail; and Mr. Darrell said, 'Sold even yourname!' My father heard him say it in the hall at Fawley. Mr. Darrellwas there during a long vacation, and your father came to see him. Yourfather fired up, and they never saw each other, I believe, again. "

Lionel remained still as if thunder-stricken. Something in his mother'slanguage and manner had at times made him suspect that she was not sowell born as his father. But it was not the discovery that she was atradesman's daughter that galled him; it was the thought that his fatherwas bought for the altar out of the county jail! It was those cuttingwords, "Sold even your name. " His face, before very crimson, becamelivid; his head sank on his breast. He walked towards the old gloomyhouse by Fairthorn's side, as one who, for the first time in life, feelson his heart the leaden weight of an hereditary shame. 

CHAPTER VI. 

 Showing how sinful it is in a man who does not care for his honour to beget children. 

When Lionel saw Mr. Fairthorn devoting his intellectual being to thecontents of a cold chicken-pie, he silently stepped out of the room andslunk away into a thick copse at the farthest end of the paddock. Helonged to be alone. The rain descended, not heavily, but in penetratingdrizzle; he did not feel it, or rather he felt glad that there was nogaudy mocking sunlight. He sat down forlorn in the hollows of a glenwhich the copse covered, and buried his face in his clasped hands. 

Lionel Haughton, as the reader may have noticed, was no premature man, --a manly boy, but still a habitant of the twilight, dreamy, shadow-land ofboyhood. Noble elements were stirring fitfully within him, but theiragencies were crude and undeveloped. Sometimes, through the nativeacuteness of his intellect, he apprehended truths quickly and truly as aman; then, again, through the warm haze of undisciplined tenderness, orthe raw mists of that sensitive pride in which objects, small inthemselves, loom large with undetected outlines, he fell back into thepassionate dimness of a child's reasoning. He was intensely ambitious;Quixotic in the point of honour; dauntless in peril: but morbidlytrembling at the very shadow of disgrace, as a foal, destined to be thewar-horse and trample down levelled steel, starts in its tranquilpastures at the rustling of a leaf. Glowingly romantic, but not inclinedto vent romance in literary creations, his feelings were the more high-wrought and enthusiastic because they had no outlet in poetic channels. Most boys of great ability and strong passion write verses--it isNature's relief to brain and heart at the critical turning age. Mostboys thus gifted do so; a few do not, and out of those few Fate selectsthe great men of action, --those large luminous characters that stamppoetry on the world's prosaic surface. Lionel had in him the pith andsubstance of Fortune's grand nobodies, who become Fame's abruptsomebodies when the chances of life throw suddenly in their way a noblesomething, to be ardently coveted and boldly won. But I repeat, as yethe was a boy; so he sat there, his hands before his face, an unreasoningself-torturer. He knew now why this haughty Darrell had written with solittle tenderness and respect to his beloved mother. Darrell looked onher as the cause of his ignoble kinsman's "sale of name;" nay, mostprobably ascribed to her not the fond girlish love which levels alldisparities of rank, but the vulgar cold-blooded design to exchange herfather's bank-notes for a marriage beyond her station. And he was thedebtor to this supercilious creditor, as his father had been before him. His father! till then he had been so proud of that relationship! Mrs. Haughton had not been happy with her captain; his confirmed habits ofwild dissipation had embittered her union, and at last worn away herwifely affections. But she had tended and nursed him in his last illnessas the lover of her youth; and though occasionally she hinted at hisfaults, she ever spoke of him as the ornament of all society, --poor, it is true, harassed by unfeeling creditors, but the finest of finegentlemen. Lionel had never heard from her of the ancestral estates soldfor a gambling debt; never from her of the county jail nor the mercenarymisalliance. In boyhood, before we have any cause to be proud ofourselves, we are so proud of our fathers, if we have a decent excuse forit. Of his father could Lionel Haughton be proud now? And Darrell wascognizant of his paternal disgrace, had taunted his father in yonder oldhall--for what?--the marriage from which Lionel sprang! The hands grewtighter and tighter before that burning face. He did not weep, as he haddone in Vance's presence at a thought much less galling. Not that tearswould have misbecome him. Shallow judges of human nature are they whothink that tears in themselves ever misbecome boy or even man. Well didthe sternest of Roman writers place the arch distinction of humanityaloft from all meaner of Heaven's creatures, in the prerogative of tears!Sooner mayst thou trust thy purse to a professional pickpocket than giveloyal friendship to the man who boasts of eyes to which the heart nevermounts in dew! Only, when man weeps he should be alone, --not becausetears are weak, but because they should be sacred. Tears are akin toprayers. Pharisees parade prayer! impostors parade tears. O Pegasus, Pegasus, --softly, softly, --thou hast hurried me off amidst the clouds:drop me gently down--there, by the side of the motionless boy in theshadowy glen. 

CHAPTER VII. 

 Lionel Haughton, having hitherto much improved his chance of fortune, decides the question, "What will he do with it?"

"I have been seeking you everywhere, " said a well-known voice; and a handrested lightly on Lionel's shoulder. The boy looked up, startled, butyet heavily, and saw Guy Darrell, the last man on earth he could havedesired to see. "Will you come in for a few minutes? you are wanted. "

"What for? I would rather stay here. Who can want me?"

Darrell, struck by the words and the sullen tone in which they wereuttered, surveyed Lionel's face for an instant, and replied in a voiceinvoluntarily more kind than usual, --

"Some one very commonplace, but since the Picts went out of fashion, verynecessary to mortals the most sublime. I ought to apologize for hiscoming. You threatened to leave me yesterday because of a defect in yourwardrobe. Mr. Fairthorn wrote to my tailor to hasten hither and repairit. He is here. I commend him to your custom! Don't despise himbecause he makes for a man of my remote generation. Tailors are keenobservers and do not grow out of date so quickly as politicians. "

The words were said with a playful good-humour very uncommon to Mr. Darrell. The intention was obviously kind and kinsmanlike. Lionelsprang to his feet; his lip curled, his eye flashed, and his crest rose. 

"No, sir; I will not stoop to this! I will not be clothed by yourcharity, --yours! I will not submit to an implied taunt upon my poormother's ignorance of the manners of a rank to which she was not born!You said we might not like each other, and, if so, we should partforever. I do not like you, and I will go!" He turned abruptly, andwalked to the house--magnanimous. If Mr. Darrell had not been the mostsingular of men, he might well have been offended. As it was, though fewwere less accessible to surprise, he was surprised. But offended? Judgefor yourself. "I declare, " muttered Guy Darrell, gazing on the boy'sreceding figure, "I declare that I almost feel as if I could once againbe capable of an emotion! I hope I am not going to like that boy! Theold Darrell blood in his veins, surely. I might have spoken as he did athis age, but I must have had some better reason for it. What did I sayto justify such an explosion?

"/Quid feci?--ubi lapsus?/ Gone, no doubt, to pack up his knapsack, andtake the Road to Ruin! Shall I let him go? Better for me, if I amreally in danger of liking him; and so be at his mercy to sting--what?my heart! I defy him; it is dead. No; he shall not go thus. I am thehead of our joint houses. Houses! I wish he had a house, poor boy! Andhis grandfather loved me. Let him go? I will beg his pardon first; andhe may dine in his drawers if that will settle the matter. "

Thus, no less magnanimous than Lionel, did this misanthropical man followhis ungracious cousin. "Ha!" cried Darrell, suddenly, as, approachingthe threshold, he saw Mr. Fairthorn at the dining-room window occupied innibbing a pen upon an ivory thumb-stall--"I have hit it! That abominableFairthorn has been shedding its prickles! How could I trust flesh andblood to such a bramble? I'll know what it was this instant!" Vainmenace! No sooner did Mr. Fairthorn catch glimpse of Darrell'scountenance within ten yards of the porch, than, his conscience takingalarm, he rushed incontinent from the window, the apartment, and, ereDarrell could fling open the door, was lost in some lair--"nullispenetrabilis astris"--in that sponge-like and cavernous abode wherewithbenignant Providence had suited the locality to the creature. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

 New imbroglio in that ever-recurring, never-to-be-settled question, "What will he do with it?"

With a disappointed glare and a baffled shrug of the shoulder, Mr. Darrell turned from the dining-room, and passed up the stairs to Lionel'schamber, opened the door quickly, and extending his hand said, in thattone which had disarmed the wrath of ambitious factions, and even (iffame lie not) once seduced from the hostile Treasury-bench a placeman'svote, "I must have hurt your feelings, and I come to beg your pardon!"

But before this time Lionel's proud heart, in which ungrateful angercould not long find room, had smitten him for so ill a return to well-meant and not indelicate kindness. And, his wounded egotism appeasedby its very outburst, he had called to mind Fairthorn's allusions toDarrell's secret griefs, --griefs that must have been indeed stormy so tohave revulsed the currents of a life. And, despite those griefs, thegreat man had spoken playfully to him, --playfully in order to make lightof obligations. So when Guy Darrell now extended that hand, and stoopedto that apology, Lionel was fairly overcome. Tears, before refused, nowfound irresistible way. The hand he could not take, but, yielding to hisyearning impulse, he threw his arms fairly round his host's neck, leanedhis young cheek upon that granite breast, and sobbed out incoherent wordsof passionate repentance, honest, venerating affection. Darrell's facechanged, looking for a moment wondrous soft; and then, as by an effort ofsupreme self-control, it became severely placid. He did not return thatembrace, but certainly he in no way repelled it; nor did he trust himselfto speak till the boy had exhausted the force of his first feelings, andhad turned to dry his tears. 

Then he said, with a soothing sweetness: "Lionel Haughton, you havethe heart of a gentleman that can never listen to a frank apology forunintentional wrong but what it springs forth to take the blame to itselfand return apology tenfold. Enough! A mistake no doubt, on both sides. More time must elapse before either can truly say that he does not likethe other. Meanwhile, " added Darrell, with almost a laugh, --and thatconcluding query showed that even on trifles the man was bent upon eitherforcing or stealing his own will upon others, --"meanwhile must I sendaway the tailor?" I need not repeat Lionel's answer. 

CHAPTER IX. 

 DARRELL--mystery in his past life--What has he done with it?

Some days passed, each day varying little from the other. It was thehabit of Darrell if he went late to rest to rise early. He never allowedhimself more than five hours sleep. A man greater than Guy Darrell--SirWalter Raleigh--carved from the solid day no larger a slice for Morpheus. And it was this habit perhaps, yet more than temperance in diet, whichpreserved to Darrell his remarkable youthfulness of aspect and frame, sothat at fifty-two he looked, and really was, younger than many a strongman of thirty-five. For, certain it is, that on entering middle life, he who would keep his brain clear, his step elastic, his muscles fromfleshiness, his nerves from tremor, --in a word, retain his youth in spiteof the register, --should beware of long slumbers. Nothing ages likelaziness. The hours before breakfast Darrell devoted first to exercise, whatever the weather; next to his calm scientific pursuits. At teno'clock punctually he rode out alone and seldom returned till late inthe afternoon. Then he would stroll forth with Lionel into deviouswoodlands, or lounge with him along the margin of the lake, or lie downon the tedded grass, call the boy's attention to the insect populacewhich sports out its happy life in the summer months, and treat of theways and habits of each varying species, with a quaint learning, halfhumorous, half grave. He was a minute observer and an accomplishednaturalist. His range of knowledge was, indeed, amazingly large for aman who has had to pass his best years in a dry and absorbing study:necessarily not so profound in each section as that of a specialprofessor; but if the science was often on the surface, the thoughts hededuced from what he knew were as often original and deep. A maxim ofhis, which he dropped out one day to Lionel in his careless manner, butpointed diction, may perhaps illustrate his own practice and its results"Never think it enough to have solved the problem started by another mindtill you have deduced from it a corollary of your own. "

After dinner, which was not over till past eight o'clock, they alwaysadjourned to the library, Fairthorn vanishing into a recess, Darrell andLionel each with his several book, then an air on the flute, and each tohis own room before eleven. No life could be more methodical; yet toLionel it had an animating charm, for his interest in his host dailyincreased, and varied his thoughts with perpetual occupation. Darrell, on the contrary, while more kind and cordial, more cautiously on hisguard not to wound his young guest's susceptibilities than he had beenbefore the quarrel and its reconciliation, did not seem to feel forLionel the active interest which Lionel felt for him. He did not, asmost clever men are apt to do in their intercourse with youth, attemptto draw him out, plumb his intellect, or guide his tastes. If he wasat times instructive, it was because talk fell on subjects on which itpleased himself to touch, and in which he could not speak withoutinvoluntarily instructing. Nor did he ever allure the boy to talk of hisschool-days, of his friends, of his predilections, his hopes, his future. In short, had you observed them together, you would have never supposedthey were connections, that one could and ought to influence and directthe career of the other. You would have said the host certainly likedthe guest, as any man would like a promising, warm-hearted, high-spirited, graceful boy, under his own roof for a short time, but who feltthat that boy was nothing to him; would soon pass from his eye; formfriends, pursuits, aims, with which he could be in no way commingled, forwhich he should be wholly irresponsible. There was also this peculiarityin Darrell's conversation; if he never spoke of his guest's past andfuture, neither did he ever do more than advert in the most general termsto his own. Of that grand stage on which he had been so brilliant anactor he imparted no reminiscences; of those great men, the leaders ofhis age, with whom he had mingled familiarly, he told no anecdotes. Equally silent was he as to the earlier steps in his career, the modesby which he had studied, the accidents of which he had seized advantage, --silent there as upon the causes he had gained, or the debates he hadadorned. Never could you have supposed that this man, still in the primeof public life, had been the theme of journals and the boast of party. Neither did he ever, as men who talk easily at their own hearths areprone to do, speak of projects in the future, even though the projects beno vaster than the planting of a tree or the alteration of a parterre, --projects with which rural life so copiously and so innocently teems. Thepast seemed as if it had left to him no memory, the future as if itstored for him no desire. But did the past leave no memory? Why thenat intervals would the book slide from his eye, the head sink upon thebreast, and a shade of unutterable dejection darken over the grand beautyof that strong stern countenance? Still that dejection was not morbidlyfed and encouraged, for he would fling it from him with a quick impatientgesture of the head, resume the book resolutely, or change it for anotherwhich induced fresh trains of thought, or look over Lionel's shoulder, and make some subtile comment on his choice, or call on Fairthorn for theflute; and in a few minutes the face was severely serene again. And beit here said, that it is only in the poetry of young gentlemen, or theprose of lady novelists, that a man in good health and of sound intellectwears the livery of unvarying gloom. However great his causes of sorrow, he does not forever parade its ostentatious mourning, nor follow thehearse of his hopes with the long face of an undertaker. He will stillhave his gleams of cheerfulness, his moments of good humour. The oldsmile will sometimes light the eye, and awake the old playfulness of thelip. But what a great and critical sorrow does leave behind is often farworse than the sorrow itself has been. It is a change in the inner man, which strands him, as Guy Darrell seemed stranded, upon the shoal of thePresent; which the more he strives manfully to bear his burden warns himthe more from dwelling on the Past; and the more impressively it enforcesthe lesson of the vanity of human wishes strikes the more from hisreckoning illusive hopes in the Future. Thus out of our threefoldexistence two parts are annihilated, --the what has been, the what shallbe. We fold our arms, stand upon the petty and steep cragstone, whichalone looms out of the Measureless Sea, and say to ourselves, lookingneither backward nor beyond, "Let us bear what is;" and so for the momentthe eye can lighten and the lip can smile. 

Lionel could no longer glean from Mr. Fairthorn any stray hints uponthe family records. That gentleman had evidently been reprimanded forindiscretion, or warned against its repetition, and he became as reservedand mum as if he had just emerged from the cave of Trophonius. Indeed heshunned trusting himself again alone to Lionel, and affecting a longarrear of correspondence on behalf of his employer, left the lad duringthe forenoons to solitary angling, or social intercourse with the swansand the tame doe. But from some mystic concealment within doors wouldoften float far into the open air the melodies of that magic flute; andthe boy would glide back, along the dark-red mournful walls of the oldhouse, or the futile pomp of pilastered arcades in the uncompleted newone, to listen to the sound: listening, he, blissful boy, forgot thepresent; he seized the unchallenged royalty of his years. For him norebels in the past conspired with poison to the wine-cup, murder to thesleep. No deserts in the future, arresting the march of ambition, said, "Here are sands for a pilgrim, not fields for a conqueror. "

CHAPTER X. 

 In which chapter the history quietly moves on to the next. 

Thus nearly a week had gone, and Lionel began to feel perplexed as to theduration of his visit. Should he be the first to suggest departure? Mr. Darrell rescued him from that embarrassment. On the seventh day, Lionelmet his host in a lane near the house, returning from his habitual ride. The boy walked home by the side of the horseman, patting the steed, admiring its shape, and praising the beauty of another saddle-horse, smaller and slighter, which he had seen in the paddock exercised by agroom. "Do you ever ride that chestnut? I think it even handsomer thanthis. "

"Half our preferences are due to the vanity they flatter. Few can ridethis horse; any one, perhaps, that. "

"There speaks the Dare-all!" said Lionel, laughing. The host did notlook displeased. 

"Where no difficulty, there no pleasure, " said he in his curt laconicdiction. "I was in Spain two years ago. I had not an English horsethere, so I bought that Andalusian jennet. What has served him at need, no /preux chevalier/ would leave to the chance of ill-usage. So thejennet came with me to England. You have not been much accustomed toride, I suppose?"

"Not much; but my dear mother thought I ought to learn. She pinched fora whole year to have me taught at a riding-school during one schoolvacation. "

"Your mother's relations are, I believe, well off. Do they suffer her topinch?"

"I do not know that she has relations living; she never speaks of them. "

"Indeed!" This was the first question on home matters that Darrell hadever directly addressed to Lionel. He there dropped the subject, andsaid, after a short pause, "I was not aware that you are a horseman, or Iwould have asked you to accompany me; will you do so to-morrow, and mountthe jennet?"

"Oh, thank you; I should like it so much. "

Darrell turned abruptly away from the bright, grateful eyes. "I am onlysorry, " he added, looking aside, "that our excursions can be but few. OnFriday next I shall submit to you a proposition; if you accept it, weshall part on Saturday, --liking each other, I hope: speaking for myself, the experiment has not failed; and on yours?"

"On mine!--oh, Mr. Darrell, if I dared but tell you what recollections ofyourself the experiment will bequeath to me!"

"Do not tell me, if they imply a compliment, " answered Darrell, with thelow silvery laugh which so melodiously expressed indifference andrepelled affection. He entered the stable-yard, dismounted; and onreturning to Lionel, the sound of the flute stole forth, as if from theeaves of the gabled roof. "Could the pipe of Horace's Faunus be sweeterthan that flute?" said Darrell, "'Utcunque dulci, Tyndare, fistula, Valles, ' etc. 

What a lovely ode that is! What knowledge of town life! whatsusceptibility to the rural! Of all the Latins, Horace is the only onewith whom I could wish to have spent a week. But no! I could not havediscussed the brief span of human life with locks steeped in Malobathranbalm and wreathed with that silly myrtle. Horace and I would havequarrelled over the first heady bowl of Massie. We never can quarrelnow! Blessed subject and poet-laureate of Queen Proserpine, and, I dareswear, the most gentlemanlike poet she ever received at court; henceforthhis task is to uncoil the asps from the brows of Alecto, and arrest theambitious Orion from the chase after visionary lions. "

CHAPTER XI. 

 Showing that if a good face is a letter of recommendation, a good heart is a letter of credit. 

The next day they rode forth, host and guest, and that ride proved aneventful crisis in the fortune of Lionel Haughton. Hitherto I haveelaborately dwelt on the fact that whatever the regard Darrell mightfeel for him, it was a regard apart from that interest which accepts aresponsibility and links to itself a fate. And even if, at moments, thepowerful and wealthy man had felt that interest, he had thrust it fromhim. That he meant to be generous was indeed certain, and this he hadtypically shown in a very trite matter-of-fact way. The tailor, whosevisit had led to such perturbation, had received instructions beyond themere supply of the raiment for which he had been summoned; and a largepatent portmanteau, containing all that might constitute the liberaloutfit of a young man in the rank of gentleman, had arrived at Fawley, and amazed and moved Lionel, whom Darrell had by this time thoroughlyreconciled to the acceptance of benefits. The gift denoted this:"In recognizing you as kinsman, I shall henceforth provide for you asgentleman. " Darrell indeed meditated applying for an appointment in oneof the public offices, the settlement of a liberal allowance, and aparting shake of the hand, which should imply, "I have now behaved asbecomes me: the rest belongs to you. We may never meet again. There isno reason why this good-by may not be forever. "

But in the course of that ride, Darrell's intentions changed. Wherefore?You will never guess! Nothing so remote as the distance between causeand effect, and the cause for the effect here was--poor little Sophy. 

The day was fresh, with a lovely breeze, as the two riders rode brisklyover the turf of rolling commons, with the feathery boughs ofneighbouring woodlands tossed joyously to and fro by the sportive summerwind. The exhilarating exercise and air raised Lionel's spirits, andreleased his tongue from all trammels; and when a boy is in high spirits, ten to one but he grows a frank egotist, feels the teeming life of hisindividuality, and talks about himself. Quite unconsciously, Lionelrattled out gay anecdotes of his school-days; his quarrel with ademoniacal usher; how he ran away; what befell him; how the doctor wentafter, and brought him back; how splendidly the doctor behaved, --neitherflogged nor expelled him, but after patiently listening, while he rebukedthe pupil, dismissed the usher, to the joy of the whole academy; how hefought the head boy in the school for calling the doctor a sneak; how, licked twice, he yet fought that head boy a third time, and licked him;how, when head boy himself, he had roused the whole school into a civilwar, dividing the boys into Cavaliers and Roundheads; how clay was rolledout into cannon-balls and pistol-shots, sticks shaped into swords, theplayground disturbed to construct fortifications; how a slovenly stoutboy enacted Cromwell; how he himself was elevated into Prince Rupert; andhow, reversing all history, and infamously degrading Cromwell, Rupertwould not consent to be beaten; and Cromwell at the last, disabled by anuntoward blow across the knuckles, ignominiously yielded himselfprisoner, was tried by a court-martial, and sentenced to be shot! To allthis rubbish did Darrell incline his patient ear, --not encouraging, notinterrupting, but sometimes stifling a sigh at the sound of Lionel'smerry laugh, or the sight of his fair face, with heightened glow on hischeeks, and his long silky hair, worthy the name of lovelocks, blown bythe wind from the open loyal features, which might well have graced theportrait of some youthful Cavalier. On bounded the Spanish jennet, onrattled the boy rider. He had left school now, in his headlong talk; hewas describing his first friendship with Frank Vance, as a lodger at hismother's; how example fired him, and he took to sketch-work and painting;how kindly Vance gave him lessons; how at one time he wished to be apainter; how much the mere idea of such a thing vexed his mother, and howlittle she was moved when he told her that Titian was of a very ancientfamily, and that Francis I. , archetype of gentleman, visited Leonardo daVinci's sick-bed; and that Henry VIII. Had said to a pert lord who hadsnubbed Holbein, "I can make a lord any day, but I cannot make aHolbein!" how Mrs. Haughton still confounded all painters in the generalimage of the painter and the plumber who had cheated her so shamefully inthe renewed window-sashes and redecorated walls, which Time and the fourchildren of an Irish family had made necessary to the letting of thefirst floor. And these playful allusions to the maternal ideas werestill not irreverent, but contrived so as rather to prepossess Darrell inMrs. Haughton's favour by bringing out traits of a simple natural mother, too proud, perhaps, of her only son, not caring what she did, how sheworked, so that he might not lose caste as a born Haughton. Darrellunderstood, and nodded his head approvingly. "Certainly, " he said, speaking almost for the first time, "Fame confers a rank above that ofgentlemen and of kings; and as soon as she issues her patent of nobility, it matters not a straw whether the recipient be the son of a Bourbon orof a tallow-chandler. But if Fame withhold her patent; if a well-bornman paint aldermen, and be not famous (and I dare say you would have beenneither a Titian nor a Holbein), --why, he might as well be a painter andplumber, and has a better chance even of bread and cheese by standing tohis post as gentleman. Mrs. Haughton was right, and I respect her. "

"Quite right. If I lived to the age of Methuselah, I could not paint ahead like Frank Vance. "

"And even he is not famous yet. Never heard of him. "

"He will be famous: I am sure of it; and if you lived in London, youwould hear of him even now. Oh, sir! such a portrait as he painted theother day! But I must tell you all about it. " And therewith Lionelplunged at once, medias res, into the brief broken epic of little Sophy, and the eccentric infirm Belisarius for whose sake she first toiled andthen begged; with what artless eloquence he brought out the colours ofthe whole story, --now its humour, now its pathos; with what beautifyingsympathy he adorned the image of the little vagrant girl, with her mienof gentlewoman and her simplicity of child; the river excursion toHampton Court; her still delight; how annoyed he felt when Vance seemedashamed of her before those fine people; the orchard scene in which hehad read Darrell's letter, that, for the time, drove her from theforemost place in his thoughts; the return home, the parting, her wistfullook back, the visit to the Cobbler's next day; even her farewell gift, the nursery poem, with the lines written on the fly-leaf, he had them byheart! Darrell, the grand advocate, felt he could not have produced on ajury, with those elements, the effect which that boy-narrator produced onhis granite self. 

"And, oh, sir!" cried Lionel, checking his horse, and even arrestingDarrell's with bold right hand--"oh, " said he, as he brought his moistand pleading eyes in full battery upon the shaken fort to which he hadmined his way--"oh, sir! you are so wise and rich and kind, do rescuethat poor child from the penury and hardships of such a life! If youcould but have seen and heard her! She could never have been born to it!You look away: I offend you! I have no right to tax your benevolence forothers; but, instead of showering favours upon me, so little wouldsuffice for her!--if she were but above positive want, with that old man(she would not be happy without him), safe in such a cottage as you giveto your own peasants! I am a man, or shall be one soon; I can wrestlewith the world, and force my way somehow; but that delicate child, avillage show, or a beggar on the high road!--no mother, no brother, noone but that broken-down cripple, leaning upon her arm as his crutch. Icannot bear to think of it. I am sure I shall meet her again somewhere;and when I do, may I not write to you, and will you not come to her help?Do speak; do say 'Yes, ' Mr. Darrell. "

The rich man's breast heaved slightly; he closed his eyes, but for amoment. There was a short and sharp struggle with his better self, andthe better self conquered. 

"Let go my reins; see, my horse puts down his ears; he may do you amischief. Now canter on: you shall be satisfied. Give me a moment to--to unbutton my coat: it is too tight for me. "

CHAPTER XII. 

 Guy Darrell gives way to an impulse, and quickly decides what he will do with it. 

"Lionel Haughton, " said Guy Darrell, regaining his young cousin's side, and speaking in a firm and measured voice, "I have to thank you for onevery happy minute; the sight of a heart so fresh in the limpid purity ofgoodness is a luxury you cannot comprehend till you have come to my age;journeyed, like me, from Dan to Beersheba, and found all barren. Heedme: if you had been half-a-dozen years older, and this child for whom youplead had been a fair young woman, perhaps just as innocent, just ascharming, --more in peril, --my benevolence would have lain as dormant as astone. A young man's foolish sentiment for a pretty girl, --as your truefriend, I should have shrugged my shoulders and said, 'Beware!' Had Ibeen your father, I should have taken alarm and frowned. I should haveseen the sickly romance which ends in dupes and deceivers. But at yourage, you, hearty, genial, and open-hearted boy, --you, caught but by thechivalrous compassion for helpless female childhood, --oh, that you weremy son, --oh, that my dear father's blood were in those knightly veins!I had a son once! God took him;" the strong man's lips quivered: hehurried on. "I felt there was manhood in you, when you wrote to fling mychurlish favours in my teeth; when you would have left my roof-tree in aburst of passion which might be foolish, but was nobler than the wisdomof calculating submission, manhood, but only perhaps man's pride as man, --man's heart not less cold than winter. To-day you have shown mesomething far better than pride; that nature which constitutes the heroictemperament is completed by two attributes, --unflinching purpose, disinterested humanity. I know not yet if you have the first; you revealto me the second. Yes! I accept the duties you propose to me; I will domore than leave to you the chance of discovering this poor child. I willdirect my solicitor to take the right steps to do so. I will see thatshe is safe from the ills you feel for her. Lionel, more still, I amimpatient till I write to Mrs. Haughton. I did her wrong. Remember, Ihave never seen her. I resented in her the cause of my quarrel with yourfather, who was once dear to me. Enough of that. I disliked the tone ofher letters to me. I disliked it in the mother of a boy who had Darrellblood; other reasons too, --let them pass. But in providing for youreducation; I certainly thought her relations provided for her support. She never asked me for help there; and, judging of her hastily, I thoughtshe would not have scrupled to do so, if my help there had not beenforestalled. You have made me understand her better; and, at all events, three-fourths of what we are in boyhood most of us owe to our mothers!You are frank, fearless, affectionate, a gentleman. I respect the motherwho has such a son. "

Certainly praise was rare upon Darrell's lips; but when he did praise, heknew how to do it! And no man will ever command others who has not bynature that gift! It cannot be learned. Art and experience can onlyrefine its expression. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

He who sees his heir in his own child, carries his eye over hopes andpossessions lying far beyond his gravestone, viewing his life, even here, as a period but closed with a comma. He who sees his heir in anotherman's child, sees the full stop at the end of the sentence. 

Lionel's departure was indefinitely postponed; nothing more was said ofit. Meanwhile Darrell's manner towards him underwent a marked change. The previous indifference the rich kinsman had hitherto shown as to theboy's past life, and the peculiarities of his intellect and character, wholly vanished. He sought now, on the contrary, to plumb thoroughly themore hidden depths which lurk in the nature of every human being, andwhich, in Lionel, were the more difficult to discern from the vivacityand candour which covered with so smooth and charming a surface a pridetremulously sensitive, and an ambition that startled himself in the hourswhen solitude and revery reflect upon the visions of youth the giantoutline of its own hopes. 

Darrell was not dissatisfied with the results of his survey; yet often, when perhaps most pleased, a shade would pass over his countenance; andhad a woman who loved him been by to listen, she would have heard theshort slight sigh which came and went too quickly for the duller sense ofman's friendship to recognize it as the sound of sorrow. 

In Darrell himself, thus insensibly altered, Lionel daily discovered moreto charm his interest and deepen his affection. In this man's naturethere were, indeed, such wondrous under-currents of sweetness, sosuddenly gushing forth, so suddenly vanishing again! And exquisite inhim were the traits of that sympathetic tact which the world calls finebreeding, but which comes only from a heart at once chivalrous andtender, the more bewitching in Darrell from their contrast with a mannerusually cold, and a bearing so stamped with masculine, self-willed, haughty power. Thus--days went on as if Lionel had become a very childof the house. But his sojourn was in truth drawing near to a close notless abrupt and unexpected than the turn in his host's humours to whichhe owed the delay of his departure. 

One bright afternoon, as Darrell was standing at the window of hisprivate study, Fairthorn, who had crept in on some matter of business, looked at his countenance long and wistfully, and then, shambling up tohis side, put one hand on his shoulder with a light timid touch, and, pointing with the other to Lionel, who was lying on the grass in front ofthe casement reading the "Faerie Queene, " said, "Why do you take him toyour heart if he does not comfort it?"

Darrell winced and answered gently, "I did not know you were in the room. Poor Fairthorn; thank you!"

"Thank me!--what for?"

"For a kind thought. So, then, you like the boy?"

"Mayn't I like him?" asked Fairthorn, looking rather frightened; "surelyyou do!"

"Yes, I like him much; I am trying my best to love him. But, but"--Darrell turned quickly, and the portrait of his father over themantelpiece came full upon his sight, --an impressive, a haunting face, --sweet and gentle, yet with the high narrow brow and arched nostril ofpride, with restless melancholy eyes, and an expression that revealed thedelicacy of intellect, but not its power. There was something forlorn, but imposing, in the whole effigy. As you continued to look at thecountenance, the mournful attraction grew upon you. Truly a touching anda most lovable aspect. Darrell's eyes moistened. 

"Yes, my father, it is so!" he said softly. "All my sacrifices were invain. The race is not to be rebuilt! No grandchild of yours willsucceed me, --me, the last of the old line! Fairthorn, how can I lovethat boy? He may be my heir, and in his veins not a drop of my father'sblood!"

"But he has the blood of your father's ancestors; and why must you thinkof him as your heir?--you, who, if you would but go again into the world, might yet find a fair wi--"

With such a stamp came Darrell's foot upon the floor that the holy andconjugal monosyllable dropping from Fairthorn's lips was as much cut intwo as if a shark had snapped it. Unspeakably frightened, the poor mansidled away, thrust himself behind a tall reading-desk, and, peeringaslant from that covert, whimpered out, "Don't, don't now, don't be soawful; I did not mean to offend, but I'm always saying something I didnot mean; and really you look so young still "(coaxingly), "and, and--"

Darrell, the burst of rage over, had sunk upon a chair, his face bowedover his hands, and his breast heaving as if with suppressed sobs. 

The musician forgot his fear; he sprang forward, almost upsetting thetall desk; he flung himself on his knees at Darrell's feet, and exclaimedin broken words, "Master, master, forgive me! Beast that I was! Do lookup--do smile or else beat me--kick me. "

Darrell's right hand slid gently from his face, and fell into Fairthorn'sclasp. 

"Hush, hush, " muttered the man of granite; "one moment, and it will beover. "

One moment! That might be but a figure of speech; yet before Lionel hadfinished half the canto that was plunging him into fairyland, Darrell wasstanding by him with his ordinary tranquil mien; and Fairthorn's flutefrom behind the boughs of a neighbouring lime-tree was breathing out anair as dulcet as if careless Fauns still piped in Arcady, and Grief werea far dweller on the other side of the mountains, of whom shepherds, reclining under summer leaves, speak as we speak of hydras and unicorns, and things in fable. 

On, on swelled the mellow, mellow, witching music; and now the worn manwith his secret sorrow, and the boy with his frank glad laugh, arepassing away, side by side, over the turf, with its starry and goldenwild-flowers, under the boughs in yon Druid copse, from which they startthe ringdove, --farther and farther, still side by side, now out of sight, as if the dense green of the summer had closed around them like waves. But still the flute sounds on, and still they hear it, softer and softeras they go. Hark! do you not hear it--you?

CHAPTER XIV. 

 There are certain events which to each man's life are as comets to the earth, seemingly strange and erratic portents; distinct from the ordinary lights which guide our course and mark our seasons, yet true to their own laws, potent in their own influences. Philosophy speculates on their effects, and disputes upon their uses; men who do not philosophize regard them as special messengers and bodes of evil. 

They came out of the little park into a by-lane; a vast tract of commonland, yellow with furze and undulated with swell and hollow, spreading infront; to their right the dark beechwoods, still beneath the weight ofthe July noon. Lionel had been talking about the "Faerie Queene, "knight-errantry, the sweet impossible dream-life that, safe from Time, glides by bower and hall, through magic forests and by witching eaves inthe world of poet-books. And Darrell listened, and the flute-notesmingled with the atmosphere faint and far off, like voices from thatworld itself. 

Out then they came, this broad waste land before them; and Lionel saidmerrily, --

"But this is the very scene! Here the young knight, leaving his father'shall, would have checked his destrier, glancing wistfully now over thatgreen wild which seems so boundless, now to the 'umbrageous horror' ofthose breathless woodlands, and questioned himself which way to take foradventure. "

"Yes, " said Darrell, coming out from his long reserve on all thatconcerned his past life, --"Yes, and the gold of the gorse-blossomstempted me; and I took the waste land. " He paused a moment, and renewed:"And then, when I had known cities and men, and snatched romance fromdull matter-of-fact, then I would have done as civilization does withromance itself, --I would have enclosed the waste land for my ownaggrandizement. Look, " he continued, with a sweep of the hand round thewidth of prospect, "all that you see to the verge of the horizon, somefourteen years ago, was to have been thrown into the pretty paddock wehave just quitted, and serve as park round the house I was then building. Vanity of human wishes! What but the several proportions of their commonfolly distinguishes the baffled squire from the arrested conqueror?Man's characteristic cerebral organ must certainly be acquisitiveness. "

"Was it his organ of acquisitiveness that moved Themistocles to boastthat 'he could make a small state great'?" "Well remembered, --ingeniously quoted, " returned Darrell, with the polite bend of hisstately head. "Yes, I suspect that the coveting organ had much to dowith the boast. To build a name was the earliest dream of Themistocles, if we are to accept the anecdote that makes him say, 'The trophies ofMiltiades would not suffer him to sleep, ' To build a name, or to create afortune, are but varying applications of one human passion. The desireof something we have not is the first of our childish remembrances: itmatters not what form it takes, what object it longs for; still it is toacquire! it never deserts us while we live. "

"And yet, if I might, I should like to ask, what you now desire that youdo not possess?"

"I--nothing; but I spoke of the living! I am dead. Only, " addedDarrell, with his silvery laugh, "I say, as poor Chesterfield said beforeme, 'It is a secret: keep it. '"

Lionel made no reply; the melancholy of the words saddened him: butDarrell's manner repelled the expression of sympathy or of interest; andthe boy fell into conjecture, what had killed to the world this man'sintellectual life?

And thus silently they continued to wander on till the sound of the flutehad long been lost to their ears. Was the musician playing still?

At length they came round to the other end of Fawley village, and Darrellagain became animated. 

"Perhaps, " said he, returning to the subject of talk that had beenabruptly suspended, --"perhaps the love of power is at the origin of eachrestless courtship of Fortune: yet, after all, who has power with lessalloy than the village thane? With so little effort, so little thought, the man in the manor-house can make men in the cottage happier here belowand more fit for a hereafter yonder. In leaving the world I come fromcontest and pilgrimage, like our sires the Crusaders, to reign at home. "

As he spoke, he entered one of the cottages. An old paralytic man wasseated by the fire, hot though the July sun was out of doors; and hiswife, of the same age, and almost as helpless, was reading to him achapter in the Old Testament, --the fifth chapter in Genesis, containingthe genealogy, age, and death of the patriarchs before the Flood. Howthe faces of the couple brightened when Darrell entered. "Master Guy!"said the old man, tremulously rising. The world-weary orator and lawyerwas still Master Guy to him. 

"Sit down, Matthew, and let, me read you a chapter. " Darrell took theHoly Book, and read the Sermon on the Mount. Never had Lionel heardanything like that reading; the feeling which brought out the depth ofthe sense, the tones, sweeter than the flute, which clothed the divinewords in music. As Darrell ceased, some beauty seemed gone from the day. He lingered a few minutes, talking kindly and familiarly, and then turnedinto another cottage, where lay a sick woman. He listened to herailments, promised to send her something to do her good from his ownstores, cheered up her spirits, and, leaving her happy, turned to Lionelwith a glorious smile, that seemed to ask, "And is there not power inthis?"

Put it was the sad peculiarity of this remarkable man that all his moodswere subject to rapid and seemingly unaccountable variations. It was asif some great blow had fallen on the mainspring of his organization, andleft its original harmony broken up into fragments each impressive initself, but running one into the other with an abrupt discord, as a harpplayed upon by the winds. For, after this evident effort at self-consolation or self-support in soothing or strengthening others, suddenlyDarrell's head fell again upon his breast, and he walked on, up thevillage lane, heeding no longer either the open doors of expectantcottagers or the salutation of humble passers-by. "And I could have beenso happy here!" he said suddenly. "Can I not be so yet? Ay, perhaps, when I am thoroughly old, --tied to the world but by the thread of anhour. Old men do seem happy; behind them, all memories faint, save thoseof childhood and sprightly youth; before them, the narrow ford, and thesun dawning up through the clouds on the other shore. 'T is the criticaldescent into age in which man is surely most troubled; griefs gone, stillrankling; nor-strength yet in his limbs, passion yet in his heart-reconciled to what loom nearest in the prospect, --the armchair and thepalsied head. Well! life is a quaint puzzle. Bits the most incongruousjoin into each other, and the scheme thus gradually becomes symmetricaland clear; when, lo! as the infant claps his hands and cries, 'See! see!the puzzle is made out!' all the pieces are swept back into the box, --black box with the gilded nails. Ho! Lionel, look up; there is ourvillage church, and here, close at my right, the churchyard!"

Now while Darrell and his young companion were directing their gaze tothe right of the village lane, towards the small gray church, --towardsthe sacred burial-ground in which, here and there amongst humbler graves, stood the monumental stone inscribed to the memory of some formerDarrell, for whose remains the living sod had been preferred to thefamily vault; while both slowly neared the funeral spot, and leaned, silent and musing, over the rail that fenced it from the animals turnedto graze on the sward of the surrounding green, --a foot-traveller, astranger in the place, loitered on the threshold of the small waysideinn, about fifty yards off to the left of the lane, and looked hard atthe still figures of the two kinsmen. 

Turning then to the hostess, who was standing somewhat within thethreshold, a glass of brandy-and-water in her hand, the third glass thatstranger had called for during his half hour's rest in the hostelry, quoth the man, "The taller gentleman yonder is surely your squire, is he not? but whois the shorter and younger person?"

The landlady put forth her head. 

"Oh! that is a relation of the squire down on a visit, sir. I heardcoachman say that the squire's taken to him hugely; and they do think atthe Hall that the young gentleman will be his heir. "

"Aha!--indeed--his heir! What is the lad's name? What relation can hebe to Mr. Darrell?"

"I don't know what relation exactly, sir; but he is one of the Haughtons, and they've been kin to the Fawley folks time out of mind. "

"Haughton?--aha! Thank you, ma'am. Change, if you please. "

The stranger tossed off his dram, and stretched his hand for his change. 

"Beg pardon, sir, but this must be forring money, " said the landlady, turning a five-franc piece on her palm with suspicious curiosity. 

"Foreign! Is it possible?" The stranger dived again into his pocket, and apparently with some difficulty hunted out half-a-crown. 

"Sixpence more, if you please, sir; three brandies, and bread-and-cheeseand the ale too, sir. "

"How stupid I am! I thought that French coin was a five shilling piece. I fear I have no English money about me but this half-crown; and I can'task you to trust me, as you don't know me. "

"Oh, sir, 't is all one if you know the squire. You may be passing thisway again. "

"I shall not forget my debt when I do, you may be sure, " said thestranger; and, with a nod, he walked away in the same direction asDarrell and Lionel had already taken, through a turnstile by a publicpath that, skirting the churchyard and the neighbouring parsonage, ledalong a cornfield to the demesnes of Fawley. 

The path was narrow, the corn rising on either side, so that two personscould not well walk abreast. Lionel was some paces in advance, Darrellwalking slow. The stranger followed at a distance: once or twice hequickened his pace, is if resolved to overtake Darrell; then apparentlyhis mind misgave him, and he again fell back. 

There was something furtive and sinister about the man. Little could beseen of his face, for he wore a large hat of foreign make, slouched deepover his brow, and his lips and jaw were concealed by a dark and fullmustache and beard. As much of the general outline of the countenance asremained distinguishable was nevertheless decidedly handsome; but acomplexion naturally rich in colour seemed to have gained the heated lookwhich comes with the earlier habits of intemperance before it fades intothe leaden hues of the later. 

His dress bespoke pretension to a certain rank: but its component partswere strangely ill-assorted, out of date, and out of repair; pearl-coloured trousers, with silk braids down their sides; brodequins tomatch, --Parisian fashion three years back, but the trousers shabby, thebraiding discoloured, the brodequins in holes. The coat-once a blackevening dress-coat--of a cut a year or two anterior to that of thetrousers; satin facing, -cloth napless, satin stained. Over all, a sortof summer travelling-cloak, or rather large cape of a waterproof silk, once the extreme mode with the lions of the Chaussee d'Autin wheneverthey ventured to rove to Swiss cantons or German spas; but which, from acertain dainty effeminacy in its shape and texture, required the minutestelegance in the general costume of its wearer as well as the cleanliestpurity in itself. Worn by this traveller, and well-nigh worn out too, the cape became a finery mournful as a tattered pennon over a wreck. 

Yet in spite of this dress, however unbecoming, shabby, obsolete, asecond glance could scarcely fail to note the wearer as a man wonderfullywell-shaped, --tall, slender in the waist, long of limb, but with a girthof chest that showed immense power; one of those rare figures that afemale eye would admire for grace, a recruiting sergeant for athleticstrength. 

But still the man's whole bearing and aspect, even apart from the dismalincongruities of his attire, which gave him the air of a beggaredspendthrift, marred the favourable effect that physical comeliness initself produces. Difficult to describe how, --difficult to say why, --butthere is a look which a man gets, and a gait which he contracts when therest of mankind cut him; and this man had that look and that gait. 

"So, so, " muttered the stranger. "That boy his heir? so, so. How can Iget to speak to him? In his own house he would not see me: it must be asnow, in the open air; but how catch him alone? and to lurk in the inn, in his own village, --perhaps for a day, --to watch an occasion;impossible! Besides, where is the money for it? Courage, courage!"He quickened his pace, pushed back his hat. "Courage! Why not now?Now or never!"

While the man thus mutteringly soliloquized, Lionel had reached the gatewhich opened into the grounds of Fawley, just in the rear of the littlelake. Over the gate he swung himself lightly, and, turning back toDarrell cried, "Here is the doe waiting to welcome you. "

Just as Darrell, scarcely heeding the exclamation, and with his musingeyes on the ground, approached the gate, a respectful hand opened itwide, a submissive head bowed low, a voice artificially soft falteredforth words, broken and, indistinct, but of which those most audiblewere--"Pardon, me; something to communicate, --important; hear me. "

Darrell started, just as the traveller almost touched him, started, recoiled, as one on whose path rises a wild beast. His bended headbecame erect, haughty, indignant, defying; but his cheek was pale, andhis lip quivered. "You here! You in England-at Fawley! You presume toaccost me! You, sir, --you!"

Lionel just caught the sound of the voice as the doe had come timidly upto him. He turned round sharply, and beheld Darrell's stern, imperiouscountenance, on which, stern and imperious though it was, a hasty glancecould discover, at once, a surprise that almost bordered upon fear. Ofthe stranger still holding the gate he saw but the back, and his voice hedid not hear, though by the man's gesture he was evidently replying. Lionel paused a moment irresolute; but as the man continued to speak, hesaw Darrell's face grow paler and paler, and in the impulse of a vaguealarm he hastened towards him; but just within three feet of the spot, Darrell arrested his steps. 

"Go home, Lionel; this person would speak to me in private. " Then, in a lower tone, he said to the stranger, "Close the gate, sir; you arestanding upon the land of my fathers. If you would speak with me, thisway;" and, brushing through the corn, Darrell strode towards a patch ofwaste land that adjoined the field: the man followed him, and both passedfrom Lionel's eyes. The doe had come to the gate to greet her master;she now rested her nostrils on the bar, with a look disappointed andplaintive. 

"Come, " said Lionel, "come. " The doe would not stir. 

So the boy walked on alone, not much occupied with what had just passed. "Doubtless, " thought he, "some person in the neighbourhood upon countrybusiness. "

He skirted the lake, and seated himself on a garden bench near the house. What did he there think of?--who knows? Perhaps of the Great World;perhaps of little Sophy! Time fled on: the sun was receding in the westwhen Darrell hurried past him without speaking, and entered the house. 

The host did not appear at dinner, nor all that evening. Mr. Mills madean excuse: Mr. Darrell did not feel very well. 

Fairthorn had Lionel all to himself, and having within the last few daysreindulged in open cordiality to the young guest, he was especiallycommunicative that evening. He talked much on Darrell, and with all theaffection that, in spite of his fear, the poor flute-player felt for hisungracious patron. He told many anecdotes of the stern man's tenderkindness to all that came within its sphere. He told also anecdotes morestriking of the kind man's sternness where some obstinate prejudice, someruling passion, made him "granite. "

"Lord, my dear young sir, " said Fairthorn, "be his most bitter openenemy, and fall down in the mire, the first hand to help you would be GuyDarrell's; but be his professed friend, and betray him to the worth of astraw, and never try to see his face again if you are wise, --the mostforgiving and the least forgiving of human beings. But--"

The study door noiselessly opened, and Darrell's voice called out, "Fairthorn, let me speak with you. "

CHAPTER XV. 

 Every street has two sides, the shady side and the sunny. When two men shake hands and part, mark which of the two takes the sunny side: he will be the younger man of the two. 

The next morning, neither Darrell nor Fairthorn appeared at breakfast;but as soon as Lionel had concluded that meal, Mr. Mills informed him, with customary politeness, that Mr. Darrell wished to speak with him inthe study. Study, across the threshold of which Lionel had never yet setfootstep! He entered it now with a sentiment of mingled curiosity andawe. Nothing in it remarkable, save the portrait of the host's fatherover the mantelpiece. Books strewed tables, chairs, and floors in thedisorder loved by habitual students. Near the window was a glass bowlcontaining gold-fish, and close by, in its cage, a singing-bird. Darrellmight exist without companionship in the human species, but not withoutsomething which he protected and cherished, --a bird, even a fish. 

Darrell looked really ill: his keen eye was almost dim, and the lines inhis face seemed deeper. But he spoke with his usual calm, passionlessmelody of voice. 

"Yes, " he said, in answer to Lionel's really anxious inquiry; "I am ill. Idle persons like me give way to illness. When I was a busy man, I neverdid; and then illness gave way to me. My general plans are thus, if notactually altered, at least hurried to their consummation sooner than Iexpected. Before you came here, I told you to come soon, or you mightnot find me. I meant to go abroad this summer; I shall now start atonce. I need the change of scene and air. You will return to Londonto-day. "

"To-day! You are not angry with me?"

"Angry! boy and cousin--no!" resumed Darrell, in a tone of unusualtenderness. "Angry-fie! But since the parting must be, 't is well toabridge the pain of long farewell. You must wish, too, to see yourmother, and thank her for rearing you up so that you may step frompoverty into ease with a head erect. You will give to Mrs. Haughton thisletter: for yourself, your inclinations seem to tend towards the army. But before you decide on that career, I should like you to see somethingmore of the world. Call to-morrow on Colonel Morley, in Curzon Street:this is his address. He will receive by to-day's post a note from me, requesting him to advise you. Follow his counsels in what belongs to theworld. He is a man of the world, --a distant connection of mine, who willbe kind to you for my sake. Is there more to say? Yes. It seems anungracious speech; but I should speak it. Consider yourself sure fromme of an independent income. Never let idle sycophants lead you intoextravagance by telling you that you will have more. But indulge not theexpectation, however plausible, that you will be my heir. "

"Mr. Darrell--oh, sir--"

"Hush! the expectation would be reasonable; but I am a strange being. I might marry again, --have heirs of my own. Eh, sir, -0why not?" Darrellspoke these last words almost fiercely, and fixed his eyes on Lionel ashe repeated, --"Why not?" But seeing that the boy's face evinced nosurprise, the expression of his own relaxed, and he continued calmly, --"Enough; what I have thus rudely said was kindly meant. It is a treasonto a young man to let him count on a fortune which at last is left awayfrom him. Now, Lionel, go; enjoy your spring of life! Go, hopeful andlight-hearted. If sorrow reach you, battle with it; if error misleadyou, come fearlessly to me for counsel. Why, boy, what is this?--tears?Tut, tut. "

"It is your goodness, " faltered Lionel. "I cannot help it. And is therenothing I can do for you in return?"

Yes, much. Keep your name free from stain, and your heart open to suchnoble emotions as awaken tears like those. Ah, by the by, I heard frommy lawyer to-day about your poor little protegee. Not found yet, but heseems sanguine of quick success. You shall know the moment I hear more. "

"You will write to me, then, sir, and I may write to you?"

"As often as you please. Always direct to me here. "

"Shall you be long abroad?"

Darrell's brows met. "I don't know, " said he, curtly. "Adieu. "

He opened the door as he spoke. 

Lionel looked at him with wistful yearning, filial affection, through hisswimming eyes. "God bless you, sir, " he murmured simply, and passedaway. 

"That blessing should have come from me!" said Darrell to himself, as heturned back, and stood on his solitary hearth. "But they on whose headsI once poured a blessing, where are they, --where? And that man's tale, reviving the audacious fable which the other, and I verily believe theless guilty knave of the two, sought to palm on me years ago! Stop; letme weigh well what he said. If it were true! Oh, shame, shame!"

Folding his arms tightly on his breast, Darrell paced the room with slow, measured strides, pondering deeply. He was, indeed, seeking to suppressfeeling, and to exercise only judgment; and his reasoning process seemedat length fully to satisfy him, for his countenance gradually cleared, and a triumphant smile passed across it. "A lie, --certainly a palpableand gross lie; lie it must and shall be. Never will I accept it astruth. Father" (looking full at the portrait over the mantel-shelf), "Father, fear not--never--never!"