onged to the Lanswell family for many
generations. The Lanswells were a wealthy race--they owned not only all
the land surrounding the fair domain of Cawdor, but nearly the whole of
the town of Dunmore. The Earl of Lanswell was also Baron of Raleigh, and
Raleigh Hall, in Staffordshire, was a very grand estate. In one part of
it an immense coal mine had been discovered, which made Lord Lanswell
one of the wealthiest men of the day.

Cawdor, Raleigh Hall, and Dunmore House, three of the finest residences
in England, together with a rent-roll counted by hundreds of thousands,
should have made the earl a happy man. He married a wealthy heiress in
accordance with the old proverb that "Like seeks like." His wife, Lucia,
Countess of Lanswell, was one of the proudest peeresses in England; she
was unimpeachable in every relation of life, and had little pity for
those who were not; she had never known sorrow, temptation, doubt, or
anything else; she had lived in an atmosphere of perfect content and
golden ease; she had the grandest mansion, the finest diamonds, the
finest horses in London; she had the most indulgent husband, the
handsomest son, and the prettiest daughter; she did not know the word
want in any shape, she had not even suffered from the crumpled
rose-leaf. The nearest approach to trouble of any kind that she had
known was that her son, Lord Chandos, had failed in one of his
examinations. He asked that he might go into the country for some months
to read, and permission was most cheerfully given to him. With her
daughter, Lady Imogene Chandos, the countess had never had and never
expected to have any trouble; she was one of the fairest, sweetest, and
most gentle of girls; she was docile and obedient; she had never in her
life given the least trouble to any one.

Lord Lanswell was walking up and down one of the broad terraces at
Cawdor one fine morning in July, when one of the servants brought to him
a telegram. He opened it hastily, it was from his son, Lord Chandos:

"DEAREST FATHER,--Will you run up to town, and meet me at Dunmore
House this evening? I have something very important to tell you.
Not one word to mother yet."

Lord Lanswell stood still to think with the telegram in his hand.

"What can be the matter now?" he said to himself; "that boy will give me
trouble. He has done something now that he will not let my lady know."

He had a dull, heavy presentiment that the boy who should have b