ccepted without anger as being natural, but threw aside as
being useless. Of course he would not answer it. They all knew that he
never answered their letters. As to the final petition he had nothing
to say to it.

The next was from Lord George, and shall also be given:--

"MY DEAR BROTHERTON,--I cannot let the tidings which I have just
heard pass by without expressing my sympathy. I am very sorry
indeed that you should have lost your son. I trust you will credit
me for saying so much with absolute truth.

"Yours always,

"GEORGE GERMAIN."

"I don't believe a word of it," he said almost out loud. To his
thinking it was almost impossible that what his brother said should be
true. Why should he be sorry,--he that had done his utmost to prove
that Popenjoy was not Popenjoy? He crunched the letter up and cast it
on one side. Of course he would not answer that.

The third was from a new correspondent; and that also the reader shall
see;--

"MY DEAR LORD MARQUIS,--Pray believe that had I known under what
great affliction you were labouring when you left Rudham Park I
should have been the last man in the world to intrude myself upon
you. Pray believe me also when I say that I have heard of your
great bereavement with sincere sympathy, and that I condole with
you from the bottom of my heart. Pray remember, my dear Lord, that
if you will turn aright for consolation you certainly will not
turn in vain.

"Let me add, though this is hardly the proper moment for such
allusion, that both his lordship the Bishop and myself were most
indignant when we heard of the outrage committed upon you at your
hotel. I make no secret of my opinion that the present Dean of
Brotherton ought to be called upon by the great Council of the
Nation to vacate his promotion. I wish that the bench of bishops
had the power to take from him his frock.

"I have the honour to be,

"My Lord Marquis,

"With sentiments of most unfeigned respect,

"Your Lordship's most humble servant,

"JOSEPH GROSCHUT."

The Marquis smiled as he also threw this letter into the waste-paper
basket, telling himself that birds of that feather very often did fall
out with one another.

CHAPTER LIV.

JACK DE BARON'S VIRTUE.

We must now go back to Jack De Baron, who left Rudham Park the same day
as the Marquis,--having started b