ntled. It was too vast for a citizen, and the
locality was no longer sufficiently refined for a conscript father.
In this dilemma, Neuchatel stepped in and purchased the whole
affair--palace, and park, and deer, and pictures, and halls, and
galleries of statue and bust, and furniture, and even wines, and all the
farms that remained, and all the seigneurial rights in the royal forest.
But he never lived there. Though he spared nothing in the maintenance
and the improvement of the domain, except on a Sunday he never visited
it, and was never known to sleep under its roof. "It will be ready for
those who come after me," he would remark, with a modest smile.

Those who came after him were two sons, between whom his millions were
divided; and Adrian, the eldest, in addition to his share, was made the
lord of Hainault. Adrian had inherited something more, and something
more precious, than his father's treasure--a not inferior capacity,
united, in his case, with much culture, and with a worldly ambition to
which his father was a stranger. So long as that father lived, Adrian
had been extremely circumspect. He seemed only devoted to business, and
to model his conduct on that of his eminent sire. That father who had
recognised with pride and satisfaction his capacity, and who was without
jealousy, had initiated his son during his lifetime in all the secrets
of his wondrous craft, and had entrusted him with a leading part in
their affairs. Adrian had waited in Downing Street on Lord Liverpool, as
his father years before had waited on Mr. Pitt.

The elder Neuchatel departed this life a little before the second French
Revolution of 1830, which had been so fatal to Mr. Ferrars. Adrian, who
had never committed himself in politics, further than sitting a short
time for a reputed Tory borough, for which he paid a rent of a thousand
a year to the proprietor, but who was known to have been nurtured in the
school of Pitt and Wellington, astonished the world by voting for Lord
Grey's Reform Bill, and announcing himself as a Liberal. This was a
large fish for the new Liberal Treasury to capture; their triumph was
great, and they determined to show that they appreciated the power and
the influence of their new ally. At the dissolution of 1831, Adrian
Neuchatel was a candidate for a popular constituency, and was elected
at the head of the poll. His brother, Melchior, was also returned, and
a nephew. The Liberals were alarmed by a subscription