ion which belongs to a man of the world enabled him to detect
that I had smoothed over matters more than became a faithful narrator.

He shook his head, and, seating himself on the sofa, motioned me to come
to his side; then, leaning his arm over my shoulder, he said, in his
seductive, wincing way,--

"We two young fellows should understand each other when we talk of
money matters. I can say to you what I could not say to my respectable
senior,--by three years,--your excellent father. Frankly, then, I
suspect this is a bad business. I know little about newspapers, except
that I have to subscribe to one in my county, which costs me a small
income; but I know that a London daily paper might ruin a man in a few
weeks. And as for shareholders, my dear Caxton, I was once teased
into being a shareholder in a canal that ran through my property, and
ultimately ran off with L30,000 of it! The other shareholders were all
drowned in the canal, like Pharaoh and his host in the Red Sea. But your
father is a great scholar, and must not be plagued with such matters. I
owe him a great deal. He was very kind to me at Cambridge, and gave me
the taste for reading to which I owe the pleasantest hours of my life.
So, when you and the lawyers have found out what the extent of the
mischief is, you and I must see how we can best settle it. What the
deuce! My young friend, I have no 'incumbrances,' as the servants,
with great want of politeness, call wives and children. And I am not a
miserable great landed millionnaire, like that poor dear Castleton, who
owes so many duties to society that he can't spend a shilling except
in a grand way and purely to benefit the public. So go, my boy, to
Trevanion's lawyer,--he is mine, too. Clever fellow, sharp as a needle,
Mr. Pike, in Great Ormond Street,--name on a brass plate; and when
he has settled the amount, we young scapegraces will help each other,
without a word to the old folks."

What good it does to a man, throughout life, to meet kindness and
generosity like this in his youth!

I need not say that I was too faithful a representative of my father's
scholarly pride and susceptible independence of spirit to accept this
proposal; and probably Sir Sedley, rich and liberal as he was, did
not dream of the extent to which his proposal might involve him. But I
expressed my gratitude so as to please and move this last relic of the
De Coverleys, and went from his house straight to Mr. Pike's office,
w