at you should
disinherit me of that also. I waive every claim to it. But so do I not
to my just rights. We shall see what a court of law can do."

"You may try it, and entail disgrace upon yourself and your sister. As
for my child, it will break her heart. My God! my child! my child!"

"Not, certainly, my lord, if we should succeed."

"All hopes of success are out of the question," replied his father.

"No such thing, my lord. Your mind, as I said, is enfeebled by
illness, and you yield too easily. Such conduct on your part is really
ridiculous. We shall have a tug for it, I am determined."

"Here," said his father, "cast your eye over these papers, and they
will enable you to understand, not merely the grounds upon which our
opponents proceed, but the utter hopelessness of contesting the matter
with them."

Dunroe took the papers, but before looking at them replied, with a great
deal of confidence, "you are quite mistaken there, my lord, with every
respect. They are not in a position to prove their allegations."

"How so?" said his father.

"For the best reason in the world, my lord. We have had their proofs in
our possession and destroyed them."

"I don't understand you."

"The fellow, M'Bride, of whom I think your lordship knows something,
had their documents in his possession."

"I am aware of that."

"Well, my lord, while in a drunken fit, he either lost them, or some one
took them out of his pocket. I certainly would have purchased them from
him."

"Did you know how he came by them?" asked his father, with a look of
reproof and anger.

"That, my lord, was no consideration of mine. As it was, however, he
certainty lost them; but we learned from him that Birney, the attorney,
was about to proceed to France, in order to get fresh attested copies;
upon which, as he knew the party there in whose hands the registry
was kept, Norton and he started a day or two in advance of him, and on
arriving there, they found, much to our advantage, that the register was
dead. M'Bride, however, who is an adroit fellow, and was well acquainted
with his house and premises, contrived to secure the book in which the
original record was made--which book he has burned--so that, in point of
fact, they have no legal proofs on which to proceed."

"Dishonorable man!" said his father, rising up in a state of the deepest
emotion. "You have made me weary of life; you have broken my heart: and
so you would stoop to defend yoursel