In the first place, your family will receive a
blow from which even future prosperity may not recover them. Your family
estate, already in a delicate position, may be irrecoverably lost;
the worldly consequences of such a vicissitude are very considerable;
whatever career you pursue, so long as you visibly possess Armine,
you rank always among the aristocracy of the land, and a family that
maintains such a position, however decayed, will ultimately recover. I
hardly know an exception to this rule. I do not think, of all men, that
you are most calculated to afford one.'

'What you say has long pressed itself upon us,' said Captain Armine.

'Then, again,' resumed Lord Montfort, 'the feelings and even interests
of your friends are to be considered. Poor Glastonbury! I love that old
man myself. The fall of Armine might break his heart; he would not like
to leave his tower. You see, I know your place.'

'Poor Glastonbury!' said Ferdinand.

'But above all,' continued Lord Montfort, 'the happiness, nay, the very
health and life of your parents, from whom all is now concealed, would
perhaps be the last and costliest sacrifices of your rashness.'

Ferdinand threw himself on the sofa and covered his face.

'Yet all this misery, all these misfortunes, may be avoided, and you
yourself become a calm and happy man, by--for I wish not to understate
your view of the subject, Armine--putting yourself under a pecuniary
obligation to me. A circumstance to be avoided in the common course of
life, no doubt; but is it better to owe me a favour and save your family
estate, preserve your position, maintain your friend, and prevent the
misery, and probable death, of your parents, or be able to pass me in
the street, in haughty silence if you please, with the consciousness
that the luxury of your pride has been satisfied at the cost of every
circumstance which makes existence desirable?'

'You put the case strongly,' said Ferdinand; 'but no reasoning can ever
persuade me that I am justified in borrowing 3,000L., which I can never
repay.'

'Accept it, then.'

''Tis the same thing,' said Ferdinand.

'I think not,' said Lord Montfort; 'but why do you say never?'

'Because it is utterly impossible that I ever can.'

'How do you know you may not marry a woman of large fortune?' said Lord
Montfort. 'Now you seem to me exactly the sort of man who would marry an
heiress.'

'You are thinking of my cousin,' said Ferdinand. 'I thought that