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crimes, and perhaps to be more disposed to petty vengeances than a man who is placed in the position of an example to others ought to be; and whereas he had always been disposed to consider himself a sacred person, above the ordinary slights of fortune, this tendency had grown and strengthened so, that every petty pin-prick was like a poisoned arrow to him. By natural laws of reverberation he heard more evil of himself, had more mishaps in the way of gossip, of receiving letters not intended for him, and otherwise surprising the sentiments of his neighbours than almost any one else ever had-which had made him suspicious of his neighbours in the highest degree and ready to believe every small offence a premeditated insult. This perhaps made him all the more ready to believe that his sister had conceived a villanous plan against him and his. He would not have done such a thing himself; but was not his life full of such attempts made upon him by others? everybody almost whom he encountered having one time or other conspired against his hopes or happiness. But he had always found out the plots in time. It was true that this villainy might be John's, of whom he would have believed anything; and Mary herself might be the dupe; but most likely it was Mary, who did not like him nor his wife, and who would no doubt be capable of anything to banish him finally from Penninghame, and set up there some creature of her own. This was the idea which had come into his mind, when he heard accidentally of the arrival which had made so much commotion in the north country. He had talked it over with his wife till they both saw gunpowder plots, and conspiracies incalculable in it. "You had better go and see into it yourself," Mrs. Randolph said. "I will," was the Rector's energetic reply. "And believe nobody, believe nothing but what you see with your own eyes." "Never! I will put faith in nobody," Randolph had said. And

it was in this frame of mind that he had come here. He meant to believe nobody save when they warned him of plots against himself: to trust nothing save that all the world was in a league to work him harm. But for this determined pre-conclusion, he might perhaps have been less certain of his sister's enmity to himself, and of the baseness of the deception she was practising; but he had no doubt whatever on this matter now. And he meant to expose her remorselessly. Why should he mince matters? His father was an old man and might die at any moment, and this villainy ought to be exposed at once.

With these thoughts in his mind he went round to the great door. How different was the grey north-country house from anything he was used to! The thought of his snug parsonage embosomed in greenery, roses climbing to the chimney-stacks, clustering about all the windows, soft velvet lawns and strict inclosures keeping all sacred-made him shiver at sight of the irregular building, the masses of ivy, fostering damp, the open approach, a common road free to everybody. If it ever was his, or rather when it was his-for these supposititious children would soon be done away with, and John, a man under the ban of the law, how could he ever appear to claim his inheritance-when it was his, he would soon make a difference. He would bring forward the boundaries of the Chase so as to inclose the Castle. He would make the road into a stately avenue as it once was and ought to be. What did it matter who objected? He would do it; let the village burst with rage.

The very idea of exasperating the village and making 't own his power, made the idea all the more delightful. He would soon change all this; let it but get into his hands. In the midst of these thoughts, however, Randolph met a somewhat ludicrous rebuff from Eastwood, who opened the door suddenly and softly as was his fashion, as if he hoped to find the visitor out in something improper.

"Who shall I say, sir?" said Eastwood, deferentially. This gave Randolph a sense of the most ludicrous discomfiture; for to be asked what name is to be announced when you knock at the door of your father's house is a curious sensation. It was nobody's fault unless it might have been Randolph's own, but the feeling was disagreeable. He stood for a moment dumb, staring at the questioner-then striding inside the door, pushed Eastwood out of his way. When he was within, however, somewhat conciliated by the alarmed aspect of the butler, who did not know whether to resist or what to say, he changed his mind.

"I don't want to startle my father," he said; "say Mr. Randolph Musgrave has arrived."

"I beg your pardon humbly, sir," cried Eastwood.

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No, no, it was not your fault," Randolph replied. It was not the servant's fault; but it was their fault who had made his home a place of disgrace, and no longer a fit home for him.

The Squire was seated among his books, feeling the drowsy influence of the afternoon. He had no Monograph to support his soul, and no better occupation than to rummage dully through the records of antiquity, cheered up and enlivened if he found something to reply to in Notes and Queries, but otherwise living a heavy kind of halfanimate life. When the critiques and the letters about that Monograph had ended, what a blank there was! and no other work was at hand to make up, or to tempt him to further exertions. The corner of land that he desired to attain had been bought, and had given him pleasure; but after a while the eyes are satisfied with the contemplation, and the mind almost satisfied with the calculation, of so many additional acres added to the property. The sweetness of it lay in the thought that the property was growing, that there was sufficient elasticity in the family income to make the acquisition of even a little bit of land possible.

The Squire thought this was the fruit of his own self-denial, and it gave him that glow of conscious virtue which was once supposed to be the appropriate and unfailing reward of good actions, till conscious virtue went out of fashion. This was sweet; and it was sweet to go and look at the new fields which restored the old boundary of Penninghame estate in that direction; but such gratifications cease to be sustaining to life after a time. And Mr. Musgrave was dull sitting among his books; the sounds were in his ears which he was always hearing -the far-off ring of voices that made him sensible of those inmates in his house whom he never noticed, who were to him as if they did not exist. When the mind is not very closely occupied, sounds thus heard in the house come strangely across the quiescent spirit of the solitary. Voices beloved are as music, are as sunshine, conveying a sense of happiness and soft exhilaration. Hear

ing them far off, though beyond the reach of hearing, so to speak, does not the very distant sound, the tone of love in them, make work sweet and the air warm, softening everything round the recluse? But these were not voices beloved. The old man listened to them-or rather not permitting himself to listen, heard them acutely through the mist of a separation which he did not choose to overcome. They were like something from another world, voices in the air, inarticulate, mysterious, known, yet unknown. He turned the leaves idly when these strange suggestions came to him in his solitude; he had nothing to do with them, and yet so much. This was how he was sitting, dully wistful, in that stillness of age which when it is not glad must be sad, and hearing almost as if he were already a ghost out of his grave, the strange yet familiar stir in the unseen stairs and passages, the movements of the kindly house

"Mr. Randolph Musgrave." The Squire was very much startled by the

name. He rose hastily and stood leaning upon his writing-table to see who it was that followed Eastwood into the room after a minute's interval. It seemed scarcely possible to him that it could be his son. "Randolph!" he said. The children's voices had made him think, in spite of himself, of the time was it centuries ago?—when there were two small things running about those old passages continually, and a beautiful young mother smiling upon them-and him. This had softened his heart, though by means which he would not have acknowledged. He looked out eagerly with a sensation of pleasure and relief for his son. He would (perhaps) take Randolph's advice, perhaps get some enlightenment from him. But the shock set his nerves off, and made him tremulous, though it was a shock of pleasure; and it hurt his pride so to be seen trembling, that he held himself up strained and rigid against his table." Randolph! you are a stranger, indeed," he said, and his countenance lighted up with a cloudy and tremulous smile.

("Strange that he never was seen here before in my time," said Eastwood as he withdrew. "I've seen a many queer things in families, but never nothing more queer than thistwo sons as never have been seen in the house, and children as the Squire won't give in he owns them. I thought he'd have walked right straight over little master Saturday last as if no one was there. But I don't like the looks of 'im. When he's master here I march, and that I can tell you-pretty fast, Missis Cook."

"Master Randolph ? He'll never be master here, thank God for it," said Cook with pious fervour, or more than you will go.")

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"Yes," said Randolph, walking in, "I have been a stranger, but how can we help that? It is life that separates us. We must all run our own course. I hope you are well, sir. You look well, for your time of life." It is not a pleasant thing to

be told that you look well for your time of life- unless indeed you are ninety, and the time of life is itself a matter of pride. The Squire knew he was old, and that soon he must resign his place to others; but he did not care for such a distinct intimation that others thought so too.

"I am very well," he said, curtly. "You are so completely a stranger, Randolph, that I cannot make the usual remarks on your personal appearance. You deny me the opportunity of judging if you look ill or well."

"Ah," said Randolph, "that is just what I said. We must all run our own course. My duties are at the other end of England, and I cannot be always running back and forward; but I hope to stay a few days now if you will have me. Relations should see each other now and then. I have just had a glimpse of Mary in the old hall as usual. She did not know me at first, nor, I daresay, if I had not seen her there, should I have known her""Mary is little changed," said the Squire.

"So you think, sir, seeing her every day; but there is a great change from what she was ten years ago. She was still a young woman then, and handsome. I am afraid even family partiality cannot call her anything but an old maid now."

Mr. Musgrave did not make any reply. He was not a particularly affectionate father, but Mary was part of himself, and it did not please him to hear her spoken of so.

"And, by the by," said Randolph, "how did such a thing happen I wonder? for she was handsome ;handsome and well-born, and with a little money. It is very odd she never has married. Was there anything to account for it? or is it mere illluck?"

"Ill-luck to whom?" said the Squire. "Do you think perhaps your sister never had the chance, as people say? You may dismiss that idea from your mind. She has had enough of

chances. I don't know any reason; but there must have been one I suppose. Either that nobody came whom she cared for, or-I really cannot form any other idea," he concluded sharply. It was certain that he would not have Mary discussed.

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I meant no harm," said Randolph. "She has got the old hall very nicely done up. It is not a place I would myself care to keep up, if the Castle were in my hands; but she has made it very nice. I found her there withamong her favourite studies," he added, after a momentary pause. was too early to begin direct upon the chapter of the children he felt. The Squire did not show any sign of special understanding. He nodded his head in assent.

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fectly right. I am an old man, and nobody can tell what an hour may bring forth."

"That is true at every age," said Randolph, with professional seriousness. "The idea ought to be familiar to the youngest among us. In the midst of life we are in death. I recommend everybody over whom I have the least influence to settle their affairs, so that they may not leave a nest of domestic contentions behind them. It is only less important than needful spiritual preparation, which of course should be our first care."

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"Just so," said Mr. Musgrave. "I presume you don't mean to bring me to book on that point?"

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Certainly not, sir-unless there is any special point upon which I could be of use; but you are as well able to judge as I am, and have access to all the authorities," said Randolph with dignity. "Besides, there is your own clergyman at hand, who is, no doubt, quite equal to the duties of his position. It is old Pennithorne, is it not?" he added, with a momentary lapse into a more familiar tone. "But there is no question of that. In such matters a man of your experience, sir, ought to be able to instruct the best of us.'

"The bench of bishops even," said the Squire, "sometimes I think I could-at my time of my life. But that is not the question, as you say."

"No, indeed-not to say that my best advice in every way is at your service, sir; but I thought very likely that it would be an ease to your mind to see me, to give me any instructions or directions-in short, to feel that your nearest representative understood your wishes, whatever might happen."

Now Randolph was evidently his father's representative, John being out of the question; and that John was absolutely out of the question, not only from external circumstances, but from the strong prejudice and prepossession against him in his father's mind, was certain. Yet the Squire resented this assumption as much as if John

had been his dearly-beloved son and apparent heir.

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Thanks," he said, "I feel your care for my comfort-but after all are not my direct representative."

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"Sir !" cried Randolph, reddening; "need I remind you of the disabilities, the nullity of all natural rights

"You need not remind me of anything," said Mr. Musgrave, getting up hurriedly. "I don't care to discuss that question-or anything else of the kind. Suppose we go and join Mary, who must be in the drawingroom, I suppose? It is she after all who is really my representative, knowing everything about my affairs."

"She is a woman," said Randolph, with a tone of contempt.

"That is undeniable-but women are not considered exactly as they used to be in such matters."

"I hope, sir," said the clergyman, with dignity; "that neither my sister nor you add your influence to the foolish movement about women's rights."

"Do you mean that Mary does not want a vote?" said the squire. "No, I don't suppose it has occurred to her. We add our influence to very few public movements, Randolph, bad or good. The Musgraves are not what they once were in the county; the leading part we once took is taken by others who are richer than we are. Progress is not the thing for old families, for progress means money.'

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"There are other reasons why the Musgraves do not take their proper place. I have hopes, sir," said Randolph, "that under more favourable circumstances-if we, perhaps, were to draw more together——

"What do you mean, sir?" said the Squire, "it was you who separated yourself from us, not us from you. You were too good, being a clergyman, as you said, to stand the odium of our position. That's enough, Randolph. It is not an agreeable subject. Let us dismiss it as it has been dismissed these fifteen years; and come to Mary's part of the house."

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He stopped overawed in spite of himself, by the old man's look, who stood with his face fixed looking towards him, restraining with all his force the tremor of his nerves. The Squire had been subject all his life to sudden fits of passion, and had got the habit of subduing, by ignoring them, as all his family well knew. He made no reply, but the restrained fire in his eyes impressed even the dull imagination of his son, who was pertinacious rather than daring, and had no force in him to stand against passion. Mr. Musgrave turned round quickly, and took up his book which lay on a table

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Mary sent you a copy of the Monograph?" he said, "but I don't remember that you gave me your opinion of it. It has had a very flattering reception generally. I could not have expected so much interest in the public mind on a question of such exclusive family interest. But so it has been. I have kept all the notices, and the letters I have received on the subject. You shall see them by and by; and I think you will agree with me, that a more flattering reception could scarcely have been. All sorts of people have written to me. appears," said the Squire, with modest pride," that I have really been able to throw some light upon a difficulty. After dinner, Randolph, if you are interested, you shall see my collection."

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"My time is short," said Randolph, "and with so many more serious matters to discuss

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"I know few things more serious than the history of the family honours," said the Squire, "especially as you have a boy to inherit the old family blazon; but we'll go into all that this evening, as your stay is to be short.

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