d himself rejected him, to his
surprise and indignation, for a beggarly clergyman with a small
living, on which she elected to starve; and the wealthy daughter of
a neighbouring manufacturer whom he next proposed to honour with his
gracious hand, fled from him with horror to the arms of her father,
wondering how such a man as that should ever dare to propose marriage to
an honest girl. Sir Barnes Newcome was much surprised at this outbreak
of anger; he thought himself a very ill-used and unfortunate man, a
victim of most cruel persecutions, which we may be sure did not improve
his temper or tend to the happiness of his circle at home. Peevishness,
and selfish rage, quarrels with servants and governesses, and other
domestic disquiet, Ethel had of course to bear from her brother, but not
actual personal ill-usage. The fiery temper of former days was subdued
in her, but the haughty resolution remained, which was more than a match
for her brother's cowardly tyranny: besides, she was the mistress of
sixty thousand pounds, and by many wily hints and piteous appeals to his
sister Sir Barnes sought to secure this desirable sum of money for his
poor dear unfortunate children.

He professed to think that she was ruining herself for her younger
brothers, whose expenses the young lady was defraying, this one at
college, that in the army, and whose maintenance he thought might
be amply defrayed out of their own little fortunes and his mother's
jointure: and, by ingeniously proving that a vast number of his
household expenses were personal to Miss Newcome and would never have
been incurred but for her residence in his house, he subtracted for
his own benefit no inconsiderable portion of her income. Thus the
carriage-horses were hers, for what need had he, a miserable bachelor,
of anything more than a riding-horse and a brougham? A certain number of
the domestics were hers, and as he could get no scoundrel of his own to
stay with him, he took Miss Newcome's servants. He would have had
her pay the coals which burned in his grate, and the taxes due to our
sovereign lady the Queen; but in truth, at the end of the year, with
her domestic bounties and her charities round about Newcome, which daily
increased as she became acquainted with her indigent neighbours, Miss
Ethel, the heiress, was as poor as many poorer persons.

Her charities increased daily with her means of knowing the people round
about her. She gave much time to them and tho