he had done at her: she only said, "O Algernon! is this
true?" and got up, and went to a chair and wep in quiet.

My lord opened the great box. "If you or your lawyers would like to
examine Sir George's will, it is quite at your service; you will see
here the proviso which I mentioned, that gives the entire fortune to
Lady Griffin--Lady Crabs that is: and here, my dear boy, you see the
danger of hasty conclusions. Her ladyship only showed you the FIRST PAGE
OF THE WILL, of course; she wanted to try you. You thought you made a
great stroke in at once proposing to Miss Griffin--do not mind it, my
love, he really loves you now very sincerely!--when, in fact, you
would have done much better to have read the rest of the will. You were
completely bitten, my boy--humbugged, bamboozled--ay, and by your old
father, you dog. I told you I would, you know, when you refused to lend
me a portion of your Dawkins money. I told you I would; and I DID. I had
you the very next day. Let this be a lesson to you, Percy my boy; don't
try your luck again against such old hands: look deuced well before you
leap: audi alteram partem, my lad, which means, read both sides of the
will. I think lunch is ready; but I see you don't smoke. Shall we go
in?"

"Stop, my lord," says Mr. Deuceace, very humble: "I shall not share your
hospitality--but--but you know my condition; I am penniless--you know
the manner in which my wife has been brought up--"

"The Honorable Mrs. Deuceace, sir, shall always find a home here, as if
nothing had occurred to interrupt the friendship between her dear mother
and herself."

"And for me, sir," says Deuceace, speaking faint, and very slow; "I
hope--I trust--I think, my lord, you will not forget me?"

"Forget you, sir; certainly not."

"And that you will make some provision--?"

"Algernon Deuceace," says my lord, getting up from the sophy, and
looking at him with sich a jolly malignity, as I never see, "I declare,
before heaven, that I will not give you a penny!"

Hereupon my lord held out his hand to Mrs. Deuceace, and said, "My dear,
will you join your mother and me? We shall always, as I said, have a
home for you."

"My lord," said the poar thing, dropping a curtsy, "my home is with
HIM!"

. . . . . .

About three months after, when the season was beginning at Paris, and
the autumn leafs was on the ground, my lord, my lady, me and Mortimer,
were taking a stroal in the Boddy Balong,