Before the week was ended, during which the offer of Mildool was open for his acceptance, Mr. Neuchamp had the satisfaction of handing Mr. Sticker a cheque for ten thousand pounds, which he had been obligingly permitted by his banker to draw against certain securities, and also two bills, with interest added at the rate of 8 per cent, for the balance. Upon which somewhat important documents being well scanned and examined, and further submitted to Mr. Pugsley, who was on that occasion introduced, Ernest received an order to obtain delivery of the Mildool station, having twenty-four miles frontage to the river, and going thirty miles back, with four thousand head of cattle, more or less, depasturing thereon, the same to be mustered and counted over in six weeks; any cattle deficient to be paid for by Sticker and Pugsley, at the rate of two-pounds-ten per head, and all cattle in excess to be taken by the purchaser at that price. When this transaction was concluded—on paper, Mr. Neuchamp began to realise that he was having pastoral greatness thrust upon him. Speculation is a grandly exciting occupation, when all goes well. When the bark is launched, mayhap with tremulous hope, perchance with the reckless pride of youth, there is a wondrously intoxicating triumph in noting the gradual, ever-deep, engine-flowing tide, the steady, favourable gale before which the galley which carried Cæsar and his fortunes ‘walks the waters like a thing of life,’ and finally conveys the illustrious freight to one of the fair havens of the gracious goddess Success. A triumph is decreed to Cæsar. Immediately Cæsar’s critics become bland, his enemies fangless, his friends are pacified—_they_ are always the most difficult personages to assuage; his detractors go and detract from others; his creditors burn incense before him; his feminine acquaintances dress at him, talk at him, sing at him, and _look_ at him—oh! so differently. Cæsar needs all of his unusually powerful mental attributes if he does not become abominably conceited, and straightway refer the kindness of circumstance to his own inherent talent for calculation and brilliant combination. Let him haste to place yet higher stakes upon the tables, and after the usual fluctuation and flattery of the Fiend, he arises one day ruined, undone, and despised by himself, neglected by others. The fate of Ernest Neuchamp could never thus be told. Naturally too prudent in pecuniary matters to go much further than he had good warrant for, he was even alarmed at his present comparatively risky position. But he had adopted the advice of his best friend, whose former counsels had been accurately borne out in successful practice. He had taken time to consider. Wiser heads than his own were committed to the same results; and he was according to his custom, prepared to dismiss anxiety, and to await the issue.