ith nurse and child; and Bassett would talk to his
unconscious boy, and tell him that the great house and all that
belonged to it should be his in spite of the arts that had been used to
rob him of it.

Now, of course, the greater part of all this gratulation was merely
amusing, and did no harm except stirring up the bile of a few old
bachelors, and imbittering them worse than ever against clucking cocks,
crowing hens, inflated parents, and matrimony in general.

But the overflow of it reached Huntercombe Hall, and gave cruel pain to
the childless ones, over whom this inflated father was, in fact,
exulting.

As for the christening, and the bells that pealed for it, and the
subsequent churching, they bore these things with sore hearts, and
bravely, being things of course. But when it came to their ears that
Bassett and his family called his new gravel-walk "The Heir's Walk,"
and his ridiculous nursery "The Heir's Tower," this roused a bitter
animosity, and, indeed, led to reprisals. Sir Charles built a long wall
at the edge of his garden, shutting out "The Heir's Walk" and
intercepting the view of his own premises from that walk.

Then Mr. Bassett made a little hill at the end of his walk, so that the
heir might get one peep over the wall at his rich inheritance.

Then Sir Charles began to fell timber on a gigantic scale. He went to
work with several gangs of woodmen, and all his woods, which were very
extensive, rang with the ax, and the trees fell like corn. He made no
secret that he was going to sell timber to the tune of several thousand
pounds and settle it on his wife.

Then Richard Bassett, through Wheeler, his attorney, remonstrated in
his own name, and that of his son, against this excessive fall of
timber on an entailed estate.

Sir Charles chafed like a lion stung by a gad-fly, but vouchsafed no
reply: the answer came from Mr. Oldfield; he said Sir Charles had a
right under the entail to fell every stick of timber, and turn his
woods into arable ground, if he chose; and even if he had not, looking
at his age and his wife's, it was extremely improbable that Richard
Bassett would inherit the estates: the said Richard Bassett was not
personally named in the entail, and his rights were all in supposition:
if Mr. Wheeler thought he could dispute both these positions, the Court
of Chancery was open to his client.

Then Wheeler advised Bassett to avoid the Court of Chancery in a matter
so debatable; and Sir