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they will have turned out bad for you, if you are obstinate. I ask you once more-are we to wear this galling chain or not?"

"And I tell you once more, I have no power to break it, Richard!"

"That is to say, you have no wish. Very good! The matter henceforth is dropped; and whatever happens, you have only yourself to blame for it.-And now, may I ask you, my good sir, in the character of partner, how am I to get some ready money, of which I stand much in need? I suppose my cheques upon the firm will be honoured?”

"In time, and within the limits specified by Uncle Matthew's will, no doubt they will; but, as Mr Linch will tell you"

"Bother Mr Linch! I can't wait while the accounts are being looked into, if you mean that. My uncle left some money in the bank, did he not?"

"Yes; eight hundred pounds was the exact sum, as you perhaps remember."

Richard's handsome face grew very dark, for he could not affect to misunderstand his brother's allusion. To know that one is guilty of a baseness is very bitter; to know that another knows it, is still worse; but the dregs of the gall are in the draught when that other reveals to you his knowledge. Richard hated John more than he had ever done, for those four words, "As you perhaps remember." Not a syllable, however, did he utter in rejoinder.

"I want four hundred pounds," was all he said. have it at once?"

"Can I

"Not out of our uncle's bequest, as I should suppose, at present. But I have about as much as that of my own, and I will advance it you."

"Very good. I will give you my I O U." And he sat down and wrote it accordingly, in return for his brother's cheque. Then crumpling the latter into his pocket, he lit a

D

second cigar, and strode out of the house and into the pouring rain without a word.

His scheme had been to so foreshadow their mutual relations as to disgust his brother, and compel him to enter into some arrangement to evade the conditions of their uncle's will; but having failed, he bitterly resolved that the picture he had drawn of John's discomfort should be borne out to the uttermost by the reality.

CHAPTER VII.

THE WET BLANKET.

It

Ir is often objected to the good characters in works of fiction, that they are not made sufficiently "interesting," and that the cause of morality thereby suffers; and yet, after all, the novelist is in this particular only drawing from life itself. was a complaint made by a great religious leader, in connection with the question of psalm-singing, that "the de'il had all the best tunes ;" and, in spite of some isolated efforts to prevent him, the devil still possesses them. The graces of good manners, of wit, and above all, of "naturalness," are almost always conspicuous by their absence in those who call themselves religious persons. Their "cheerfulness"-though we all agree it is highly commendable-is not attractive, since it often partakes of that character which is terined by the frivolous "deadly lively." It is not so easy to be all things to all men as an apostle might wish, and the attempt of the virtuous to win over the wicked by geniality is almost always a failure. Like the well-meant efforts of men of science to gild the pill of instruction, they fail even in the gilding. The orrery by which we are to be attracted towards the heavenly bodies is itself a melancholy object, and only amusing from the fact that it aspires to be so. So much is this the case, that a clergyman who happens to have a natural turn for humour is generally looked on with some suspicion by his

own cloth, and it is whispered: "It is a pity he took orders." And what is true in this respect of persons of earnest religious feeling, is still more so in the case of those of a rigid morality. They are not only unattractive to their fellow-creatures, but often even intolerable; which does not so much arise from their being virtuous while the rest of the world like cakes and ale, as from their want of sympathy, their reserve, and from those characteristics the possessor of which is apt to be described in brief as "a wet blanket."

"The Wet Blanket " was the name by which John Milbank was known in social circles at Hilton, as though he had been an Indian chief. He was undeniably handsome, and personal beauty is itself a powerful social auxiliary even in a man; "a good looking fellow " has, in spite of Wilkes's saying, more than a quarter of an hour's start of an ugly one, even with those of his own sex. But this advantage was thrown away in John's case by the absence of the desire to please. In women, indeed, he excited a temporary interest; but when they found he was marble it soon died away, or crystallised into the sort of admiration with which one regards a statue. It could not be said of him that "he taught in a Sunday school, and had not a vice," because he did not teach in a Sunday school. The religious sect to which, in common with his late uncle, he belonged was proud of him, by reason of his growing importance, rather than from any gracious sign of piety in the young man he would one day become a powerful member of their church, since diligence, sobriety, and intelligence unfailingly lead to power; but they did not expect from him an enthusiastic support. He attended their prayer-meetings pretty regularly, but by no means so often as he might have done; and now and then he had a tendency to "withstand the word"-that is, as Mr Linch preached it. In morals, too, he was not so much austere, which would have been creditable,

as apparently unmoved by temptation—a circumstance which, by the fair sex, was naturally felt to be insulting. Even in the most respectable circles, it may be remarked that a man who "doesn't care for ladies' society," or is not "impressionable," is held in more disfavour than a rake. John Milbank was not a saint, in short, but quite as unpopular as though he had been one. On the other hand, he had some fine qualities of a positive and active sort. He was as just as Aristides, and yet generous to a fault. For all his "getting," he never

refused to give. His hand, as more and more was poured into it, remained open as ever, not only to the necessities of the poor, but even to more doubtful claimants. He had more than once assisted his brother with money to defray his extravagances; toiled and tasked himself for months to procure funds for him, that had been wasted in a day. This, indeed, had not happened very lately, for the breach had been so wide between them, that Richard had not had the front of brass to apply to him for assistance; but, as we have seen, John had made a generous effort to secure to his brother the half of that wealth which would else, as he had good reason to suppose, have accrued to himself alone; nor could anything have proved more incontestably the confidence which his uncle had reposed in his generosity of disposition, than the hint which he had given him of the contents of his testament. Even now, notwithstanding the ungraciousness with which his kindly warning had been received, he did not regret it, nor would he have done so, even if, through it alone, his brother had saved his inheritance. His sense of duty overbore all other considerations; and only less strong than that was his sense of the obligations of kinship. He could not love his brother; the text that assumes the knowledge of that relative as a reason for loving him had no application in the case; for it was his very acquaintance with Richard's character that

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