ution. Men rallied
round them; and, not without a kind conservatism, expatiated upon the
benefits with which they endowed the country, and the evils which would
occur when they should be no more:--decay of English spirit, decay of
manly pluck, ruin of the breed of horses, and so forth, and so forth. To
give and take a black eye was not unusual nor derogatory in a gentleman;
to drive a stage-coach the enjoyment, the emulation of generous youth.
Is there any young fellow of the present time who aspires to take the
place of a stoker? You see occasionally in Hyde Park one dismal old
drag with a lonely driver. Where are you, charioteers? Where are you,
O rattling Quicksilver, O swift Defiance? You are passed by racers
stronger and swifter than you. Your lamps are out, and the music of your
horns has died away.

Just at the ending of that old time, Lord Kew's life began. That kindly
middle-aged gentleman whom his county knows that good landlord, and
friend of all his tenantry round about; that builder of churches, and
indefatigable visitor of schools; that writer of letters to the farmers
of his shire, so full of sense and benevolence; who wins prizes at
agricultural shows, and even lectures at county town institutes in his
modest, pleasant way, was the wild young Lord Kew of a quarter of a
century back; who kept racehorses, patronised boxers, fought a duel,
thrashed a Life Guardsman, gambled furiously at Crockford's, and did who
knows what besides?

His mother, a devout lady, nursed her son and his property carefully
during the young gentleman's minority: keeping him and his younger
brother away from all mischief, under the eyes of the most careful
pastors and masters. She learnt Latin with the boys, she taught them to
play on the piano: she enraged old Lady Kew, the children's grandmother,
who prophesied that her daughter-in-law would make milksops of her sons,
to whom the old lady was never reconciled until after my lord's entry at
Christchurch, where he began to distinguish himself very soon after his
first term. He drove tandems, kept hunters, gave dinners, scandalised
the Dean, screwed up the tutor's door, and agonised his mother at home
by his lawless proceedings. He quitted the University after a very
brief sojourn at that seat of learning. It may be the Oxford authorities
requested his lordship to retire; let bygones be bygones. His youthful
son, the present Lord Walham, is now at Christchurch, reading with
the gre