nerally called the hero of
this story, it is necessary that something should be said of the
particulars of his life and existence up to this period. There will be
found to be nothing very heroic about him. He is a young man with more
than a fair allowance of a young man's folly;--it may also be said of a
young man's weakness. But I myself am inclined to think that there was
but little of a young man's selfishness, with nothing of falseness or
dishonesty; and I am therefore tempted to tell his story.

He was the son of a clergyman, and the eldest of a large family of
children. But as he was the acknowledged heir to his mother's brother,
who was the squire of the parish of which his father was rector, it was
not thought necessary that he should follow any profession. This uncle
was the Squire of Buston, and was, after all, not a rich man himself.
His whole property did not exceed two thousand a year, an income which
fifty years since was supposed to be sufficient for the moderate wants
of a moderate country gentleman; but though Buston be not very far
removed from the centre of everything, being in Hertfordshire and not
more than forty miles from London, Mr. Prosper lived so retired a life,
and was so far removed from the ways of men, that he apparently did not
know but that his heir was as completely entitled to lead an idle life
as though he were the son of a duke or a brewer. It must not, however,
be imagined that Mr. Prosper was especially attached to his nephew. When
the boy left the Charter-house, where his uncle had paid his
school-bills, he was sent to Cambridge, with an allowance of two hundred
and fifty pounds a year, and that allowance was still continued to him,
with an assurance that under no circumstances could it ever be
increased. At college he had been successful, and left Cambridge with a
college fellowship. He therefore left it with one hundred and
seventy-five pounds added to his income, and was considered by all those
at Buston Rectory to be a rich young man.

But Harry did not find that his combined income amounted to riches amid
a world of idleness. At Buston he was constantly told by his uncle of
the necessity of economy. Indeed, Mr. Prosper, who was a sickly little
man about fifty years of age, always spoke of himself as though he
intended to live for another half-century. He rarely walked across the
park to the rectory, and once a week, on Sundays, entertained the
rectory family. A sad occasion