in my veins, of a family who lived on their own
property at a place bearing a Celtic name, signifying the house on the
hill, or more strictly the house on the _hillock_.

My father was what is generally termed a posthumous child--in other
words, the _gentillatre_ who begot him never had the satisfaction of
invoking the blessing of the Father of All upon his head, having departed
this life some months before the birth of his youngest son. The boy,
therefore, never knew a father's care; he was, however, well tended by
his mother, whose favourite he was; so much so, indeed, that his
brethren, the youngest of whom was considerably older than himself, were
rather jealous of him. I never heard, however, that they treated him
with any marked unkindness; and it will be as well to observe here that I
am by no means well acquainted with his early history, of which, indeed,
as I am not writing his life, it is not necessary to say much. Shortly
after his mother's death, which occurred when he was eighteen, he adopted
the profession of arms, which he followed during the remainder of his
life, and in which, had circumstances permitted, he would probably have
shone amongst the best. By nature he was cool and collected, slow to
anger, though perfectly fearless, patient of control, of great strength,
and, to crown all, a proper man with his hands.

With far inferior qualifications many a man has become a field-marshal or
general; similar ones made Tamerlane, who was not a _gentillatre_, but
the son of a blacksmith, emperor of one-third of the world; but the race
is not always for the swift, nor the battle for the strong, indeed I
ought rather to say very seldom; certain it is, that my father, with all
his high military qualifications, never became emperor, field-marshal, or
even general; indeed, he had never an opportunity of distinguishing
himself save in one battle, and that took place neither in Flanders,
Egypt, nor on the banks of the Indus or Oxus, but in Hyde Park.

Smile not, gentle reader, many a battle has been fought in Hyde Park, in
which as much skill, science and bravery have been displayed as ever
achieved a victory in Flanders or by the Indus. In such a combat as that
to which I allude, I opine that even Wellington or Napoleon would have
been heartily glad to cry for quarter ere the lapse of five minutes, and
even the Blacksmith Tartar would, perhaps, have shrunk from the opponent
with whom, after having had a disp