Lyndon had been grossly neglected during my wife's minority,
and the incapacity of the Earl her father; or, to speak more correctly,
it had been smuggled away from the Lyndon family altogether by the
adroit old hypocrite of Tiptoff Castle, who acted as most kinsmen and
guardians do by their wards and relatives, and robbed them. The Marquess
of Tiptoff returned four Members to Parliament: two for the borough of
Tippleton, which, as all the world knows, lies at the foot of our estate
of Hackton, bounded on the other side by Tiptoff Park. For time out
of mind we had sent Members for that borough, until Tiptoff, taking
advantage of the late lord's imbecility, put in his own nominees. When
his eldest son became of age, of course my Lord was to take his seat for
Tippleton; when Rigby (Nabob Rigby, who made his fortune under Clive in
India) died, the Marquess thought fit to bring down his second son, my
Lord George Poynings, to whom I have introduced the reader in a former
chapter, and determined, in his high mightiness, that he too should go
in and swell the ranks of the Opposition--the big old Whigs, with whom
the Marquess acted.

Rigby had been for some time in an ailing condition previous to his
demise, and you may be sure that the circumstance of his failing health
had not been passed over by the gentry of the county, who were staunch
Government men for the most part, and hated my Lord Tiptoff's principles
as dangerous and ruinous, 'We have been looking out for a man to fight
against him,' said the squires to me; 'we can only match Tiptoff out
of Hackton Castle. You, Mr. Lyndon, are our man, and at the next county
election we will swear to bring you in.'

I hated the Tiptoffs so, that I would have fought them at any election.
They not only would not visit at Hackton, but declined to receive those
who visited us; they kept the women of the county from receiving
my wife: they invented half the wild stories of my profligacy and
extravagance with which the neighbourhood was entertained; they said
I had frightened my wife into marriage, and that she was a lost woman;
they hinted that Bullingdon's life was not secure under my roof, that
his treatment was odious, and that I wanted to put him out of the way
to make place for Bryan my son. I could scarce have a friend to Hackton,
but they counted the bottles drunk at my table. They ferreted out my
dealings with my lawyers and agents. If a creditor was unpaid, every
item of his bi